#if anyone has recommendations please share i need to read more books like this!!

[kikuism]

it's not a guilty pleasure but i LOVE this specific brand of books with these features:

take place in the winter, in a remote, isolated area; key themes are confinement and isolation

a sense of Otherness that the main character feels, whether from the wilderness or the people

an eerie uncanny feeling that permeates through the story—something's not right....but what could it be.....the townspeople aren't telling me anything....

slowly building dread and paranoia

[abbyshands]

PALESTINE LINKS

in honor of the media blackout this week, i wanted to compile a list of links and resources regarding what’s going on in gaza. i advise all of you to give these links a look at, or to at least reblog them. the people in gaza need the bare minimum from us in that sense. &, well, if you can’t take enough time out of your day to give these links at least a look, a like, or share, then, bye !

& for all the the last of us fans out there, you need to see this. it’s genuinely a must. not to call anyone out, but i see a lot of people who have not spoken out about this at all, who, for example, keep publishing or reblogging fics etc during the blackout. i love a good fic as much as anyone else, but you can wait a week. there’s really no excuses here. if you didn’t know about the previous blackout, then now is your chance. don’t turn a blind eye to this.

at the end of this post are links specifically for those engaged in the last of us tumblr. if you aren’t going to look at the links before that, then at least look at those.

oh, & for the dumbasses who are unfollowing me for spending a week to post about a fucking genocide? fuck you, & good fucking riddance. you are not and never were welcome on my page. i don’t want you here anyways!

PALESTINE LINKS

SEVERAL ways you can help the people in gaza. some of which are fully free.

SEVERAL links regarding info around this genocide, such as places to boycott, and ways to learn more about the nature of it all.

SEVERAL ways you can help, including ways to donate, petitions you can sign, and campaigns you can join.

places you NEED to boycott. don’t buy from them, regardless of if they really fund israel or not. if they support them, that is more than enough. boycotting is a way to resist, so do it. at the end of this post are also places that are helping those who are in gaza, and families you can help escape by donating.

know that this issue did NOT begin oct. 7th. this is so much deeper than you know, and has been going on for 70+ years. click the above link to educate yourself on that front.

CLICK HERE TO HELP PALESTINE! this site has already been debunked on if it really helps the people in gaza or not, and it does. just one click is all you need. one button, once per day. you can even do it on different devices or browsers so you get more than one click in. click it daily!

CALL YOUR REPRESENTATIVES using this link, and this link (this will help you find ways to call or email them depending on where you live). also, urge biden and congress to do right by the people in gaza. the U.S. sends billions of dollars to israel every year, funding the genocide that’s ensuing as we watch on from the comfort our homes. do the bare minimum, & hold them accountable. please.

HERE ARE WAYS YOU CAN DONATE or find a PROTEST near you! not everyone is readily available to do these things, i know that. but looking into them could never hurt, or at least sharing it elsewhere so there is more awareness surrounding it.

LEARN OF AFRO-PALESTINIAN EXPERIENCES, & the efforts they have made over the years. i think it’s so, so crucial that we hear their voices, &, god, learning of all that they’ve been through, & all that they’ve done, is so inspiring.

here is some more info regarding BOYCOTTING. boycotting does, and has been proven to work. this post explains the subject a bit more in case it happens to confuse anybody, along w/companies and such that need to be boycotted, & why. as i said before, boycotting is a way to resist. so do it!

HERE IS A 🇵🇸 MASTERLIST including ways to educate yourself, donate, books you can read, & films you can watch. this is one of the best links i have regarding this genocide, and i highly recommend you look at it!

SOUTH AFRICA took israel to court for this genocide! read about it in the above link.

FOR THE LAST OF US FANS

do not remain in the dark about the last of us’s link to the ongoing conflict in gaza. neil druckmann, the director of the game, is a ZIONIST. he grew up in israel, and TLOU2 is rooted in israeli themes. now, no one is saying you have to quit playing the game, or dislike it, for all you dense ones out there. but i ask that you remain aware of this aspect of it, especially if you are regularly engaged in the last of us tumblr.

this is a link that i highly, highly recommend you read through. it discusses the HEAVILY ISRAELI THEMES TLOU2 displays. click the following link to learn more on TLOU2 & NEIL DRUCKMANN.

DO NOT BUY TLOU, TLOU REMASTERED, TLOU2, TLOU2 REMASTERED, OR ANY GAME FROM ND! neil druckmann has donated money to the IDF in the past. & where do you think he’s getting his money from? yeah, you got that. watch gameplays, pirate these games, or buy them secondhand. several shops sell used games. & for those of you who went and purchased the game anyway, knowing about all of this? fuck you.

if you think your $10 doesn’t matter, then think about this: okay, one person spends $10 on the game. whatever. but when 100,000 people do it? that’s a million dollars, going into the hands of a zionist, who is using YOUR money to help kill innocent men, women, and children. put that in your pipe and smoke it.

it is not just the games you need to boycott. HBO’S show also needs to be. follow this link to learn of more movies and shows you need to boycott, & the reasons why, including the last of us. let’s also not forget that dina & abby’s actresses are in support of israel, and BELLA RAMSEY, ellie’s actress, has also shown support.

boycott. the fucking. show. there are a million websites where you can pirate it, so you are not giving any of your support to it. resist.

i understand that not everyone is educated on this subject, and that not everyone knew of the previous media blackout. for the last of us fans, i understand that not everyone knew about the game or show’s israeli nature. but it is never too late to take part. it is never too late to care. i promise you that. if you purchased the game, at least donate to one of the sources above. that’s just bare minimum.

get educated, get loud, & GET PROUD! these are innocent people who are dying as you read this from your bed, couch, whatever. the least you can do is like & reblog so this reaches more people. your voice matters, big account or small.

FROM THE RIVER TO THE SEA, PALESTINE WILL BE FREE 🇵🇸🍉

[estrellogy]

Astro Notes Pt. 3

I have a lot of thoughts and observations that I want to share 😭 If you have any recommendations, please let me know as well 🤍

- People often see 7th house as their ideal partner, but YOU are meant to embrace traits of that sign for growth.

For example, a Libra rising will begin to see more personal growth after learning positive traits from Aries e.g. Being more assertive, believing in themselves instead of looking for others’ approval, putting themselves first, etc.

- This might be a controversial opinion, but I don’t think minor asteroids influence your chart. Asteroids like Bride, Groom, and other very specific ones. The interpretations for them can usually be found somewhere in your main placements already. It can make you over complicate your chart and feel even more disconnected with yourself because you don’t focus on your core energy.

Not every small detail about you has to be explained by astrology. At the end of the day, you’re a person with free will and complex experiences that shape you beyond astrology. This is just a tool, not a determiner of your life.

- Pluto in 5th house 🤝 destroying/deleting your creative works when they’re not up to your standards

- The difference between Venus/Pluto hard versus soft aspects is in their expression. They all are intense, magnetic, and obsessive to some degree. However, hard aspects have a harder time owning these traits so they tend to swing between extremes (e.g. total obsession and then indifference). The soft aspects are just as intense and can have the same toxic tendencies as the hard aspects, BUT they have an easier time accepting it as a part of them and seem more ‘stable’.

- 6th house placements are so overlooked! That’s literally the house of your health and daily life. I notice that when you work with your 6th house energy effectively, other areas of your life also improve.

It’s interesting that 6th house comes right before 7th house of relationships. In order to be in a relationship with someone else, you have to take good care of yourself first!

- Aries and Mars aspects (especially hard ones) can overpower other aspects in your chart until you learn how to master that energy and channel them into something productive

- Jupiter in 12th house used to be seen as negative. But I think Jupiter here is one of the luckiest placements to have. This is the placements of coincidences happening in their favors, things lining up in crazy ways, book falling off the shelf right at the page they need to read. Their experiences feel divine.

They are very connected to the Universe, Source, Spirit Guides, or whatever you believe in! Anyone can with practice, but these things come more naturally for them.

- Shoutout to my Virgo Venus and Capricorn Mars for being the only things that stop me from going off the rails 😍

- Saturn in 11th house often feel unloved by the people around them due to earlier experiences with rejection. Saturn is trying to teach them to unconditionally accept themselves. Also, those bad experiences teach them how to read people a lot better and spot the ones with bad intentions. The reward from Saturn will be genuine, solid, and loyal friendships/connections.

I’m so glad you guys enjoy these silly notes! I have a ton of fun making them 😭

[lilislegacy]

Hello everyone! I just want to say one thing real quick. If you are disappointed by Wrath of the Triple Goddess, you are allowed to feel that way and you are allowed to speak out about it. And if you want there to be a chance at change in the future, I advise trying to tell Rick in some way. As other people have said, the nice thing about Rick is that if we tell him about something we don’t like, he often fixes it. But first we actually have to tell him. It doesn’t mean you are entitled or think he works for you, but he writes the books for your enjoyment, right? So why wouldn’t he want to hear your honest feedback? Personally, if I was writing a book and 70% of my fans hated some things I was doing, I would want to know. We want him to be successful! And it doesn’t have to be all negative! You can go tell him what you like, too! But all I will say is that right now, WOTTG has nothing but shining reviews from super loyal fans. 4.4/5 stars on average. Which tells Rick one thing: keep doing exactly what you’re doing. But if we want him to understand that we don’t like certain things, like how Annabeth suddenly treats Percy like an idiot, or how Percy now constantly degrades himself and acts incompetent, a hell of a lot of people need to tell him.

Unfortunately (and completely understandably), Rick has made himself virtually unreachable by fans. He doesn’t run his own social media, he doesn’t accept fan mail or emails, and he doesn’t have a place for us to contact him.

So that only leaves 2 easy, accessible options that I can think of:

1. Leave a rating and review on Goodreads. If you would like to, go to goodreads (and any other review sites that you want), take 2 minutes to make an account, and give your thoughts. Be RESPECTFUL and civil. If you are rude and disrespectful, it helps no one. The only way to actually get his attention is to lower the rating, so, if you really want to reach him, give it 1-2 stars. Then leave a review giving your feedback, both the positive and the negative!

2. Make a tik tok. This fanbase is so loyal to Rick that I think everyone is scared to speak up. But if you make some kind of tik tok, even if it’s just showing quotes and captioning it “Separate the books and TV show” or “Stop writing Annabeth thinking Percy is dumb” or something like that, that still works. Or you can do a full sit-down review lol. Up to you. The thing about tik tok is that if one blows up, it will at least get back to someone close to Rick. And again, BE RESPECTFUL!!!!

I am sure there are more complicated ways, like emailing specific people who can reach Rick, but the ways I listed seem more realistic to me. If anyone has other ideas, please share! (AND DO NOT TRY AND REACH OUT TO THE ACTORS!! KEEP THOSE KIDS OUT OF IT!)

I am not forcing or guilting anyone into doing any of this. I’m not trying to rally troops against Rick. I’m just reminding everyone that if you don’t want to, you don’t have to suffer in silence. If you would like to give Rick your feedback in a respectful way, there are ways to do it. I’d rather he know now and be able to change things for the next book than us all stay silent and everyone despise the next one even more. Which could lead to the downfall of the whole series. And I really don’t want that.

Everyone can do what they want. If you want to go leave a big review for Rick to read, do it. If you want to make a tik tok, do it. If you just want to post about it on here, do it. If you don’t want to do any of that, don’t do any of it! No shame no matter what.

Have a wonderful day, everyone ❤️

[preseriesdean]

if you don’t mind me asking, could you share some of your favorite fanfics or authors? thanks ❤️

oh hi hello!! yes of course!! i actually haven't read any spn fic in a while but i have spent a lot of time organizing my bookmarks. i'm going to assume that you meant samdean fic but i'll add a few non-samdean ones at the end.

authors!

@zmediaoutlet (deadlybride on ao3)

candle_beck (ao3)

@goshen-applecrumbledore (ao3)

whereupon (livejournal)

Linden (ao3)

sevenfists (ao3)

there are so many more great authors but these came to mind :)

fics!

i am going to list my forever-favorites first - the ones i would recommend to anyone and everyone, screaming-from-the-rooftops kind of love - and then many many more under the cut.

beloved by urchinesque (2016, 1.9k, NR, warning: death) It might be the gentlest thing that's ever happened to them.

in my opinion everyone should read this once. it's quick. they die. it's-- happy, somehow. beautiful. i think about it all the time.

Last Day on Earth by candle_beck (2009, 10.8k, E) A list of things to do if you only have one day to live, presented in inconvenient non-list form.

last year my best friend and i were pondering which fic felt quintessential to samdean for us and somehow settled on this one. i still agree with the choice.

Odysseus, American by coyotesuspect (2010, 10k, M) Dean finds Peter O'Toole's recording of the Odyssey in a bin marked “Audio" in Casa Grande's only used bookstore. The place smells like cigarette smoke and old books, and it reminds him of Sam. Stanford era.

my favorite stanford era fic. i think it captures dean's loneliness and desperation beautifully.

A man with his insides out and his outsides off by britomart_is (2016, 5.3k, E, time travel, underage) They say there are only two stories in the world: man goes on a journey, and stranger comes to town.

another fic i want everyone to read. it's so short and feels like a novel. sam is messed up and dean is in love and everything is miserable.

Breathing Hard by whereupon (2009, 9k, E) The day Dean figures it out.

this is so simple and yet-- everything to me. i can't think about dinosaurs without thinking about this fic, which doesn't tell you much, but you'll see. sometimes this is really all you need.

The Last Outpost of All That Is by gekizetsu (2008, 59k, E) The world ends while they’re asleep.

this fic has stayed with me my whole life. i thought about it even during my years away from spn and fandom entirely. they're alone and you don't know why and they build their life together and you end up wondering, is this hell or heaven? whenever i come across a screenshot of the last couple of paragraphs i want to cry.

see things so much clearer by deadlybride (2020, 11.7k, E) Sam's been acting oddly. Dean learns how to use the history on an internet browser and finds out why.

this is a fic that hits the spot for me personally so well. another favorite preseries fic. i love the idea of sam using livejournal, and of dean finding out this way.

Stay The Distance by lazy_daze (2011, 24k, E) Sam is dependent on Dean's touch and closeness after the wall falls - Dean's presence reminds him of why he chose to wake up, and keeps the memories at bay, allowing Sam to function.

i love enmeshment, and i love that here it's literal. i love that they're just sort of fine with it.

more fics below!

in absolutely no particular order whatsover. please check the warnings and tags on these before reading!

Recall by De_Nugis (2012, 6.3k, E) Sam's having a hard time telling what's real and what isn't, especially when it comes to some voicemails from Dean.

Living in god's blind spot by applecrumbledore (2022, 25k, E) Of all the situations Dean didn’t need his dad to see him in, ‘getting off to being pushed around by a guy’ was in the top three. And ‘a guy’ was a massive glossing-over of reality. Any guy—any other guy—would be bad enough, but Sam was fucking cataclysmic.

Almost At Home by balefully (2008, 24.3k, E) Sam graduates from high school in early June in rural Tennessee. He and Dean start the summer with an all-nighter of celebration; the day after, while both fight hangovers, John calls to assign them their first hunt by themselves.

they said it was the fall of man by jukeboxhound (2016, 7.4k, M) Sam gets his soul back on a Monday.

When I Fall Asleep It Is Your Eyes That Close by britomart_is (2009, 1.9k, E) Post-Season Two. Sam is alive. Dean is happy.

Life As We Know It by sevenfists (2007, 13.7k, M, curtain fic) On the morning that Sam woke up, Dean ran five red lights on the way to the hospital, his half-empty coffee cup sloshing in the holder.

tied up like two ships by orphan_account (2014, 3.1k, E) Dean liked to hold hands.

Gospel Truth by Cerberuss (2020, 15.2k, E, case fic) ‘DOES YOUR BROTHER KNOW THAT YOU WANT HIM?’ Individually placed letters, bold and tinged brown with the weather. Sam can’t look away and he prays, dream dream dream.

Buy You A Mockingbird by candle_beck (2011, 10.3k, M, underage, outsider pov) A genuine horror story.

because you want to die for love by hathfrozen (2021, 27.3k, E) Sam and Dean settle into their Heaven—and into each other, too.

the constant vow by deadlybride (2022, 119k, E, fem dean-ish) They've just finished up a pretty standard job and are killing time in snowy Wisconsin when Dean wakes up no longer looking like Dean. That's just the start of their problems.

This Fortress Made of Us by mickeym (2009, 10.8k, E) Sam really didn't do very well without his brother. Coda for Mystery Spot.

State of Love and Trust/As I Busted Down the Pretext by cormallen (2010, 2.9k, M) When you know exactly what your brother's thinking, there are some chances you just don't take.

Quiet with the Rain by Linden (2014, 5.3k, T) Dean can spot an undercover cop at thirty paces, a hooker at twenty, and rims that will match his baby's at ten. But the fact that his little brother is in love with him—that, he can't see worth a damn.

have a cigar by deadlybride (2020, 5.6k, E) What happened with Andy and Ansem unsettles Sam. Dean doesn't seem worried.

Heart Shaped Balloon by winsive (2022, 18.5k, E, underage) Sam and Dad are fighting. No surprise, but it's the weekend before Valentine's Day and Dean isn't missing out on the chance to bang a cheerleader just to console his bratty little brother. He does bring back a heart shaped balloon for him, though. It's not supposed to be cursed.

Bare by gracerene (2022, 2.2k, T) Of all the things Dean hasn't done before, Sam never expected something as innocuous as skinny dipping to be on the list.

Speechless by candle_beck (2008, 11.2k, T, case fic) Dean loses his voice and their rapport is only moderately impaired.

Like It Was Yesterday by nomelon (2014, 4.9k, T, fem dean, amnesia) Sam can't remember a time when Dean wasn't there. Dean is always with him. Sam's whole life, there's never been anyone else.

Like a Ghost with Two Voices by Dyed_Red (2022, 46k, E) To cure Dean from the Mark of Cain, Sam has to let Dean, in all his demonic glory, possess him for 28 days. It goes about as well as expected.

Breathe You In (Choke You Down) by orphan_account (2021, 5.9k, E, pwp) Dean really likes the way Sam smells.

lost in yesterday by margaryes (2023, 1k, NR, john pov) John hasn’t seen his youngest son in 18 months.

Unraveling by Linden (2017, 855 words, E) No, he’d said, the first time Sammy had tried to kiss him, sixteen and half-drunk and stupidly beautiful, even though he’d wanted so badly to say yes.

pack up the moon by deathdreamt (2021, 5.9k, T, pre-slash) Sam storms back out from their room, his backpack on and his duffel hanging off his shoulder and isn’t it kind of tragic that his whole life fits in two bags. He looks suddenly much younger than he is, eyes shining. John is back at his guns, whiskey at his elbow, and Dean can hardly believe how rapidly his life is cracking down the centre.

Yesterday, minnesota by applecrumbledore (2022, 30k, E, case fic) Any initial awkwardness filtered away over a hundred miles of highway as Sam thumbed through the missing witch’s diary again. Some people had secret coke habits or secret second wives, and some people had passionate, pitch black, no-kissing sex with a family member every four to six months and never talked about it. You had to find ways to cope.

All Heartless Spectres, Happiness by orphan_account (2021, 5.6k, E) Lisa Braeden receives an email with the subject line, "You Deserve to Know." It contains a single video file and nothing else. (soulless sam)

The Palm Oasis by fictionallemons (2022, 12.3k, E, underage) John strands Dean and Sam at a middle-of-nowhere motel while he investigates possible demon omens in Arizona. The place is nothing to write home about, but at least it has a pool. Dean resolves to think of this as a vacation for him and his studious little brother, but when their money runs out sooner than expected, he considers turning tricks at a nearby truck stop so he can feed Sam.

Other Brothers by homo_pink (2020, 7k, M, underage, outsider pov) A callow boy can go from infancy to someone’s lover in the space of two wildflower summers.

Leader of the Pack by astolat (2007, 14.9k, E) Teaching old dogs new tricks.

Underground Wires by eggnogged (2012, 15.8k, E, fem sam, underage) It’s hard enough being a teenage girl even without all the extra crap: they move around all the time, her family is as far removed from normal as it’s possible to get, and she’s in love with her older brother. Sam has no control on any of it, she’s just trying to stay afloat.

Multitude of Sins by Linden (2015, 4.4k, T, outsider pov) Every now and again, Jim Murphy would look up from his altar and find the Winchester boys at the back of his church.

Like Arrows in the Hands of a Warrior by ADeedWithoutaName (2018, 10.3k, E, underage, dub con-ish, john pov) John Winchester loves his boys, and would take a bullet for either of them. He knows that he's doing it right, the way he's raising them, the things he's teaching them. Not every problem, however, has an easy answer. Like what to do after an incubus case in which their target got his pollen all over both of John's sons.

You Can't Lose What You Never Had by nigeltde (2016, 5.6k, E) You can't spend what you ain't got, and you can't lose what you ain't never had.

Flagstaff by Linden (2014, 7.3k, T, pre-slash, john pov) John tracked Sam down in Flagstaff, four days after he got home to find him gone.

I'll take my chance on a beautiful stranger by fleshflutter (2007, 3.8k, M, outsider pov) If Chase were a better friend, he might try to end the game now, before Brendan loses even more money. But if Brendan is a dick at Stanford, it’s nothing compared to how he is on break.

Cupid's Got A Gun by geckoholic (2012, 13.5k, E, non-con) Fuck-or-die, set in early S4. But they've been fucking for years, so that shouldn't be a problem, right? Wrong. Ever since hell, Dean's in no hurry to get that show on the road again.

Someone Else's Blood by sevenfists (2006, 6.7k, E) The first time, of course, was an accident. (pretend dating)

How Many Floors to Realize by lazy_daze (2009, 26k, E, swesson) AU from the end of It's A Terrible Life, in which Zachariah decides to keep stringing them along a little while longer, because damn if they aren't somewhat entertaining, right?

Worthless cartography by applecrumbledore (2022, 15.6k, E) Dean didn’t know what finally made him go for it. The djinn’s dream was a catalyst, but the call was coming from inside the house, and he’d been letting it ring for a very, very long time. (They get one night together right before Sam is taken to Cold Oak. Dean has to deal with that.)

The Space Between Sense and Memory by orphan_account (2021, 4.8k, T) There are a hundred unwritten rules on all the acceptable ways brothers should touch each other. There are hardly any ways at all to break them. Or; five times they follow the rules and one time they don’t.

Ions in the Ether by nigeltde (2019, 10.9k, E, case fic) When was the last time you trusted happy.

Crossed Wires by rivkat (2015, 10.9k, E) Dean thinks Sam is dead.

Crown and Anchor Me (or let me sail away) by Sena (2010, 23.7k, E, underage) Sam Winchester is fifteen years old, at yet another new high school in yet another state, he doesn't get along with his distant, distracted father, he's figuring out that he likes guys just as much as he likes girls, his clothes never fit and his limbs ache at the joint ever since his growth spurt started, he has to study for the PSAT and, oh yeah, he's a little bit in love with his brother, Dean, who's taken a break from hunting monsters to work at a local garage for minimum wage.

Wear Him Lika a Habit by sevenfists (2008, 2.2k, M) Their first kiss isn't an accident. It's anticipated well in advance, discussed for weeks, argued over, second-guessed.

Amor Prohibido by phoenixflight (2020, 3k, M, underage) They spent the spring of Sam's sophomore year living in a shitty apartment south of San Antonio. Every Friday night the clearest channel played three hour marathons of a Spanish soap called La Casa del Corazón. There was a mutually understood truce about watching it, because the alternatives were infomercials or creepy kids’ cartoons that futzed into static every fifteen seconds.

Open Road by Mollyamory (2010, 2k, T) Sam's old enough to know what's good for him.

It's the Blueprint of Your Life by queenklu (2011, 38.4k, time travel) Sam jerks awake in the middle of the night and everything goes to hell. Well, not literally, though Dean is staring down the barrel of less than a year before his deal comes due. In the midst of dealing (or not dealing) with his impending death, a killer ghost ship, and Bela showing up out of the blue, Dean also has to figure out what’s going on in Sam’s head to make him so twitchy, why he’s suddenly breezing through this case while writing endless notes in a notebook he won’t let Dean see.

North of Wednesday by Mollyamory (2008, 3.5k, G) Sam's behind the wheel before he realizes he doesn't have the keys. Coda to Mystery Spot.

non-wincest fic.

dean/omc. We Drank a Thousand Times by glorious_spoon (2010, 43k, M, warning: death) They meet in a bar fight in North Carolina when Dean is nineteen, broke, and desperate, then again when a hunt brings the Winchesters into town a few years later. Neither one of them ever puts a name to it but every once in a while, through the years, Dean finds his way back.

dean/cas: terror & desire intertwined by rupertgayes (2022, 39k, M) Faced with Castiel suffering a fate worse than death, Dean makes the decision to let Cas use his body as a temporary vessel. All things considered, Dean thinks, it could have gone worse.

gen, sam&dean: what lasts by deadlybride (2021, 17.2k, M) Not long after they move into the bunker, Dean loses a leg. Most of a leg. After the hospital, Sam brings him home, and they figure out how to live with what remains.

gen, dean-centric: To Repair Broken Men by procrastin8or951 (2015, 3.1k, T) Dad and Sam keep fighting. Dean can't fix his family, so he fixes things around the crappy apartment they are staying in.

dean/michael: our hour came round at last by orphan_account (2015, 1.8k, NR, pwp) "I want to be inside you," says Michael, low and velvet and hungry and that really shouldn't turn Dean on but it does.

dean/lucifer, dean/cas: exploratory by sp8ce (2022, 4.9k, E, non-con) One night, Castiel proposes he and Dean have sex. Except it's a little more complicated than that.

dean/cas: for a healthy heart by Askance (2013, 2.4k, T) A strange black box appears in Castiel's bedroom one afternoon.

gen, sam&dean: charmer & gentle by Askance (2015, 3.7k, G, outsider pov) The afternoon girl calls them Big and Tall, the strangers who come in late every now and then, buying this or that. The night girl doesn't think those names fit quite right.

dean/cas, past sam/dean: whose wings, though tattered, shall carry me home by fleshflutter (2009, 2.2k, T) There is a breeze moving across the field. It stirs the long grass in lapping waves like the sea. Castiel runs his fingertips through it and remembers flying.

[greenerteacups]

Your last chapter was delightful! Thank you so much!

You’ve mentioned All the Young Dudes in one of your posts and it has been a revelation. Do you have all time favorite hp fics and would care to share your recommendations please?

Oh, man, how could I ever choose? Manacled and DMATMOOBIL are obviously all-timers, but they don't need me to recommend them. Wait and Hope, similarly, is in no need of exhortation by me, but I'll do it anyway, I ate that shit up. Anything by @PacificRimbaud. Especially anything with Pansy in it. Especially Les Pèlerins. Anything by provocative_envy. Especially the college/internship AUs. You don't think an American AU for Harry Potter is going to work, until you're reading it, and wow, does it ever. Bending Light by scullymurphy. Talk about fucking atmosphere, my God. (I haven't read Falling Dark yet, I've been meaning to get around to it.) I've also been meaning to read the Gravitation series, I read the first chapter forever ago and it was one helluva opening. See, now I'm just talking about fics I haven't read and want to. Okay.

All the Young Dudes was formative because it was the first time I realized the scope of what fanfiction could do. Until then, I had a very narrow, constrained version of the kinds of stories fanfic was meant to tell (and what fanfic audiences were looking for). ATYD blew the ceiling off that by telling a story that was non-traditional, slow-paced, and completely non-focused on romance for at least half of it, and people adored it anyway. It taught me to be bolder and more creative with my choices. It made me think "well, Gryffindor Draco may not be the most popular trope in the bucket, but maybe some people will like it!" And it turned out some people did!

The Disappearances of Draco Malfoy. This was for a long time my favorite Draco redemption arc, and it remains the first fic I recommend to anyone looking to get into Dramione, because it's the perfect branching-off point for someone who loves the books. Stylistically honest and feels like Book 7, only better. Draco is not let off the hook for fuck, as is right and proper. (I'm a sucker for Book 7 rewrites, for obvious reasons.)

Boy with a Scar. All of it. Made me tear up like four times. This person understands things about Harry Potter that Rowling doesn't and perhaps never could.

Birds of a Feather is a great Tomione Hogwarts fic, and of any fic I've read, it's most interested in the practical day-to-day of life at Hogwarts, which was one of my favorite parts of the books. It's really a book about how someone like Tom, or Hermione for that matter, would experience Hogwarts if there weren't any diabolical plots happening around them: that is, as a very cool, very beautiful, but ultimately sort of mundane boarding school. It makes the place feel lived-in and real in a way that makes it a joy to come back to. And it has the most realistic depiction of child!Tom that I've ever read.

And I'm finding new ones all the time.

[apparitionism]

Bonus 4

First, a PSA: If you are eligible to vote in next week’s US election, please VOTE FOR HARRIS as well as every other Democratic candidate on the ballot, and do what you can to persuade as many other people as you can to do the same. I assume anyone who bothers to read my writing is smart enough to understand why that’s necessary—and why engaging in any sort of protest-vote or sit-this-one-out charade is counter to the interests of most living breathing people at this point in history.

Anyway. Here I offer the final part of last year’s Christmas story... again and as usual, where were we? I recommend the intro to part 1 for where we are, canon-wise (S4, essentially, but diverging); beyond that, Myka has just returned to the Warehouse after a holiday retrieval in Cleveland (Pete, in town visiting his family, was tangentially involved), where Helena, whom Myka hadn’t seen since the Warehouse didn’t explode, served as her backup—a situation facilitated by Claudia as something of a Christmas bonus. Post-retrieval, Helena and Myka shared a meal at a restaurant; this was a new experience that went quite well until, alas, Helena was instructed (by powers higher than Claudia) to leave. Thus Myka returned home, both buoyed and bereft... and here the tale resumes. I mentioned part 1, but for the full scraping of Myka’s soul, see part 2 and part 3 as well.

Bonus 4

Late on Christmas Day, Myka is heading to the kitchen for a warm and, preferably, spiked beverage, intending to curl up with that and a book—well, maybe a book; a restless scanning of her shelves had left her drained and decisionless, hence the need for a resetting, and settling, beverage—and to convince herself to appreciate the peace of these waning Christmas hours. She peeks into the living room, just to assess the wider situation, and regards a sofa-draped Pete. He returned from Ohio barely an hour ago, which Myka knows because she had heard Claudia exclaim over his arrival. Then things had gone quiet.

Now, he appears to be napping.

Myka tries to slink away.

“Claud mentioned about your backup,” he says as soon as her back is turned, startling her and proving she’s a terrible slinker. Small favors, though: at least she hadn’t already had her beverage in hand and so isn’t wearing it now. “That had to be weird,” he goes on, sitting up.

She’s been wondering whether the topic would come up, whenever they happened to get beyond how-was-your-trip pleasantries... she entertains herself for a moment with the idea of referring to Helena, specifically with Pete, as “the topic.” So she tries it: “‘Weird’ does not begin to describe the topic.” It is entertaining, as a little secret-layers-of-meaning sneak. But there’s yet more entertainment in the offing, with its own secret layers: “Incidentally, speaking of weird—which I’m sure was also mentioned—I met your cousin. Thanks for giving her an artifact. Very Christmas of you.”

He rounds his spine into the sofa like he’s trying to back his way through the upholstery and escape. “Don’t be mad. I didn’t mean to. I didn’t know it was an artifact.”

Myka is tempted to keep him guessing about her feelings, but she doesn’t really have the energy; she gives up on entertainment and tells the truth: “I’m not mad. I’m serious: thank you.”

���I think you’re trying to trick me,” he skeptics. “Soften me up for something. But if that’s for real, then you should thank my mom more than me.”

Pete’s mother. The extent of Jane Lattimer’s role in Myka’s life is... surprising. Then again the extent of her role in Pete’s life has turned out to be surprising too, and that’s probably a bigger deal, all things considered.

Pete goes on, “Because I was gonna blame her, but should I give her props instead? It was her idea to give the little feather guy to Nancy, because of how after I got it I saw that it’d probably PTSD you.”

“I appreciate the seeing, but... wait. After you got it. How’d you get it in the first place?”

“I was in this antique store,” Pete says.

As if that explains everything—when in fact it explains nothing. In further fact, it unexplains. “Why were you in an antique store? According to you, you hated those even before the Warehouse turned them into artifact arcades.”

“Mom was picking something up there, and this guy showed it to me.”

“Your mom, this guy...” Myka is now beyond suspicious. “What did this guy look like?” A pointless question. As if knowing that could help her... as if anything could really help her. This is madness. “Fine. It doesn’t matter what he looked like, because I’m stopping here. I can’t keep doing this. For my sanity, I can’t.”

“Keep doing what?”

“Tracing it back. You win. You all win.”

“Do we? Doesn’t feel like it. And that doesn’t seem like a reason you’d be thanking me.”

“No. That isn’t. But as of now I’m trying to keep myself from focusing on... let’s call it the causal chain.”

“I’d rather focus on the popcorn chain.” He points to the strands that loop the Christmas tree.

They are the tree’s only adornment. Every prior holiday season of Myka’s Warehouse association, Leena has decorated the B&B unto a traditional-Christmas Platonic ideal; this year, in her absence, Myka, Steve, and Claudia, trying to replicate that, had purchased a tree. And transported it home. And situated it near to plumb in the tree stand, which was an exhausting exercise in what they earnestly assured each other was complicated physics but was really just physical incompetence.

They had then settled in to do the actual decorating, starting with popcorn strings... but once they’d finished those, they were indeed finished, pathetically drained of holiday effort. And they’d succeeded in that initial (and sadly final) project only because, as they’d all agreed once they’d strung the popcorn, Pete hadn’t been there to shovel the bulk of their also-pathetic popping efforts into his mouth.

“Take them down, slurp them up like spaghetti if you want,” Myka says now. “Christmas is pretty much over.” The statement—its truth—makes her stew. At Pete? But the situation isn’t ultimately his fault, no matter what part he played. And why is she so set on assigning, or marinating in, this vague blame anyway? She got something she wanted: time with Helena. It didn’t work out as perfectly as she’d wished it would, but she got it.

She tries to resettle: her heart to remembrance, her brain to appreciation.

The doorbell rings, its old-fashioned rounded bing-bong resounding from foyer to living room and beyond, bouncing heavily against every surface. Myka lets the vibrations push her toward the kitchen; she’s had enough of interaction for now. Her beverage and book, whichever one will provide some right refuge, await. As do remembrance and appreciation.

She hears Pete sigh and the sofa creak; he must have shoved himself from it in order to lurch to the foyer. A minute later, he yells, “Guess what! Christmas might not be over!”

Still kitchen-focused, Myka yells back, “If that’s not Santa himself, you’re wrong!”

“Never heard of that being one of her things!” Pete shouts, even louder.

“Quit shouting!” Myka bellows, so loud that she drowns out her own initial registering of what he’s said, which then starts to resonate in her head, a stimulating hum that resolves into meaning... her things? Her things... Myka’s torso initiates a turn; her body knows what’s happening, even if her brain—

“Hey, H.G.,” Pete says, and now every part of Myka knows.

Except her eyes, but once she moves to the foyer to stand behind Pete, they know too: There Helena is. Her body. Embodied. The illumination of her, in the foyer semi-dark... her bright eyes catching Myka’s, warming to the catch... oh, this.

Seeing the sight—greeting, once again, her perfect match—she is struck dumb.

There’s movement behind her, though, and she turns to see Steve and Claudia poking their heads into the space like meerkats—well, no, in South Dakota she should think prairie dogs... but they’re both built more like meerkats than prairie dogs, so she should probably keep thinking meerkats out of... respect? Whatever: they’re animal-alert, heads aswivel, faces alight. It surely signifies something.

Turning back to Helena, trying to get a voice in her mouth, she coughs out, “You’re back? Now? I mean, already? How did you—”

“To quote myself: ‘when I can, I will,’” Helena says, as matter-of-factly as anyone could possibly speak while maintaining intense eye contact with one person, and Myka thanks all gods and firefighters above that she is herself that person. “Now, not forty-eight hours later, I could. Thus I did. I should note that I’m unsure as to why I could, but perhaps it’s a gift horse?” Her focus on Myka does not waver. Pete and the meerkats might as well not exist, and Myka in turn is mesmerized.

“Maybe that’s the horse you rode in on,” Claudia says. Is she trying to break the spell? Myka wishes she wouldn’t... she ideates shushing her, even as Claudia goes on, “But better late than never, Christmas-wise, right?”

“Did you enjoy your additional portion of squash?” Helena asks Myka, ignoring Claudia’s interjection. Her tone is formal, presenting public, but her question is for Myka alone.

“It was very good for my heart,” Myka says. She doesn’t add, though she could, And so was that question.

Helena smiles like she heard both good-fors—like she’s grateful for both—and Myka thinks, for the first time out loud in her head, She feels the same way I do.

It’s... new. Different. Perfect? Not yet, the out-loud-in-her-head voice instructs.

But she can make a move in that direction. “Please put your suitcase in my room,” she says. Out loud, outside her head. Realing it.

“I will,” Helena says. She takes up her case and moves toward the stairs, presumably to real that too.

It renders Myka once again enraptured. She is taking her suitcase to my room. My room. She is.

The first stair-creaks that Helena’s ascent occasions sound, to Myka’s eagerly interpretive ears, approving.

Claudia and Steve don’t even blink. Pete does—well, more the opposite; he widens his eyes in the cartoony way.

But then he turns on his heel, Marine-brusque and not at all cartoony, and exits the space. Myka doesn’t know what to make of that. She’ll most likely have to address the topic—in fact, “the topic”—with him later. Fortunately, later isn’t now.

She does know, however, what to make of Steve and Claudia’s aspect: “I’m sensing some ‘aren’t we clever’ preening,” she accuses.

“We are clever,” Claudia says, dusting off her shoulder. “More Fred. Don’t sweat it.”

Exasperating. “Don’t sweat it? As I understood the situation, Fred was a retrieval and an insanely expensive dinner. Are we doing that again, or is she back for good?”

“She’s back for nice,” Claudia says.

Steve jumps in with, “To answer your question: we’re not a hundred percent sure.”

“See, we made a deal,” Claudia says.

“With whom?” Myka asks.

“Santa?” Claudia says, but without commitment. Myka’s response of an oh-come-on face causes her to huff, “Fine. Pete’s mom and company. And Mrs. F. And even Artie, in absentia.”

“What kind of deal?” Myka asks, because while she can’t dispute the indisputably positive fact that Helena is here, she mistrusts any deal involving Regents. Pete’s mom aside. Or Pete’s mom included: She can’t stop her brain from stirring, stirring once again to life those causal-chain questions: What’s being put in motion this time?

“A kind of deal about which things they’re willing to let us—well, technically Steve—say are nice,” Claudia pronounces, as if that explains everything.

Myka is very tired of proffered explanations that actually unexplain.

Steve says, “Claudia finally found the file on the pen. Seems that Santa’s list, once made, is kind of ridiculously powerful. And it turns out you can put a situation on the list.”

“For example,” Claudia supplies, “H.G. and you. Getting to be in each other’s... proximity.”

Steve adds, “And yours isn’t the only one I put there. That was part of the deal.”

“So you’re letting the pen reward nice situations with... existing,” Myka says. “And are you storing it on some new ‘Don’t Neutralize’ shelf? So nobody accidentally bags the existence out of them?”

Claudia says, “Kinda. At least for a while.”

This all seems deceptively, not to mention dangerously, easy. “But: personal gain, not for,” Myka points out.

“Right,” Steve says. “So here’s a question: what does ‘personal gain’ actually mean? The manual doesn’t have a glossary. So we’re trying to work it out. Let’s say Claud uses an artifact and then makes this utterance: ‘My use of this artifact was not for personal gain.’ And let’s say I assess that utterance as not a lie. The question remains, are the Warehouse and Claud and I agreeing on the definition of ‘personal gain’?”

“The question remains,” Myka echoes, fretting. “And the answer?”

“We’ll see,” Steve says.

It’s destabilizing, but that’s the Warehouse’s fault, not Steve’s. “I just hope the artifact won’t downside you for any disagreement. Because you’re remarkably nonjudgmental, and—”

“With a Liam exception,” Steve notes. “Or several. Ideally, though, the Warehouse and I can work through these things like adults. Unlike me and Liam.”

Myka respects his honesty. And yet: “I’m having a seriously hard time ideating the Warehouse as an adult.”

“We’re working through that too,” Steve concedes.

“You clearly have the patience of a saint.”

Steve chuckles. “Pete’s your partner, right? And in another sense, H.G. might be too?” Myka waves her hands, no-no-too-soon, because suitcases notwithstanding, she has certainly in the past thought she was making a safe all-in bet, only to lose every last copper-coated-zinc penny of her metaphorical money. “No matter what we call anybody,” he continues, “I think you get a lot more patience practice than I do. I’m just dealing with one little Warehouse and its feelings.”

“Aren’t its feelings... unassimilable?” she asks. “Or at least, shouldn’t they be?” It’s a building. Whatever its feelings, they should be talking about it like it’s an alien, not somebody who’s in therapy. Or somebody who should be in therapy.

“Maybe,” Steve says. “Or maybe not. That was part of the deal too, that I would test out how it feels. About personal gain specifically here, eventually maybe more. But if it has a meltdown...”

“Ah. We cancel the test, neutralize the pen, and face the consequences.”

Steve nods. “But ideally, if that happens, we will have leapfrogged whatever the looming Artie-and-Leena crises are. The two of them coming back here safely are the other situations we niced, as part of the deal.”

Claudia adds, “My big fingers-crossed leapfrog is over their stupid administrative ‘keep H.G. away from Myka and everybody else who loves her’ dealy-thingy. We’re hoping they’ll just forget about whatever their dumbass reasons for that were when they see how great it is for her to be back.”

“Dealy-thingy? Have you been talking to Pete?” Myka asks, trying for silly, for light—so as to deflect that “love her” arrow.

“Not about that. But wait, are you saying he loves her too? I mean I figured he was okay with her after the whole Mom-still-alive thing, but his Houdini out of here just now makes me think he’s not quite all the way to—”

“Never mind,” Myka says, as a command.

Claudia squints like she wants to pursue it. Myka crosses her arms against any such idea, in response to which Claudia says, “Fine. Here’s some funsies you’ll like better. Making that list, you’ve gotta have balance. Naughty against the nice.”

“And you think I’ll like that because?”

“I talked to Pete’s cousin, a little pretty-sure-we-don’t-have-to-tesla-you-but-let’s-make-super-sure exit interview. Heard some things about a guy. Bob? Seemed like a good candidate.”

Well. Pete had been right on several levels about Christmas not being over yet. “That’s the best news I’ve had in the past... I don’t know. Five minutes?” Other than the Pete-vs.-“the topic” question, it’s been an absurdly good-news-y several minutes.

Claudia goes on, “Personal gain, what is it? There’s also a warden from that place I don’t like to remember being committed to who’s about to have a Boxing Day that’ll haunt him longer than he’s been haunting me.”

That definitely raises questions—flags, even—about “personal gain” in a definitional sense, but letting all that lie seems the better part of valor, so Myka asks Steve, “Any Liam on there?”

“Too personal to let the Warehouse anywhere near,” he says, but with a smile.

Myka smiles too. “Would that I could say the same about my situation.”

Claudia snickers. “Your situation is Warehouse-dependent. Warehouse-designed. Warehouse-destined.”

“All the more reason said Warehouse shouldn’t object to easing the pressure,” Steve says.

“Are you kidding?” Claudia says. “Its birth certificate reads ‘Ware Stress-Test House.’”

Myka appreciates their positions—Steve’s in particular, even as she internally allows that Claudia’s is probably more accurate—but she would appreciate even more their ceasing to talk about her situation like they’re the ones whose philosophy will determine how, and whether, it succeeds. Or even proceeds.

And she would most appreciate their ceasing to talk about her situation entirely. So that she can go upstairs and be in her situation, because Helena hasn’t come back downstairs, a fact for which Myka’s rapidly overheating libido has provided a similarly overheated reason: she is waiting, up there in the bedroom, for Myka.

Which thought is of course followed by Helena’s preemption of same: she descends the stairs and presents herself in the foyer.

Damn it, Myka’s disappointed libido fumes.

Sacrilege! an overriding executive self chastises, and it isn’t wrong, for again, here Helena is. To fail to appreciate that—ever—is an error of, indeed, biblical, or anti-biblical, proportions.

In any case, now four people are just standing here, awkwardness personified.

Helena flicks her eyes briefly toward Myka—it seems a little offer of “hold on”—then turns to Steve and Claudia. “I didn’t greet either of you directly when I arrived. I apologize. Claudia darling, it warms my heart to see you... and this is of course the famous Steve, whose acquaintance I’m delighted to make at last.”

Striking to witness: Helena has essentially absorbed the awkward into her very body and transmogrified it into formality.

Myka loves her.

“Famous?” Steve echoes, like she’s said “Martian.”

“I’ve heard much of you,” Helena says, with an emphasizing finger-point on “much.”

Steve smiles his I’m-astonished-you’re-not-lying smile, through which he articulates, “Likewise? I mean, likewise, but with more. Obviously.”

Yes, Myka loves her: for her charming self alone, but also for how that charm extends; her sweet attention to Steve has him immediately smitten. Myka’s the one to catch Helena’s gaze now, intending merely to convey gratitude, but to her gratification it stops Helena, causing her to abandon her engagement with Steve.

Maybe she and Myka can stand here and gaze at each other forever. It wouldn’t be everything, but it would be something. Second on second, it is something. It is something.

Claudia interrupts it all, saying to Helena, “Can I hug you?”

Myka doesn’t begrudge the breaking of this spell, particularly not with that; she had been selfish, before, greedy to keep Helena and her eyes all to herself. She also doesn’t begrudge the ease of the hug in which Claudia and Helena engage; getting a hug right is simpler when its purpose is clear. And clearly joyful.

Over Claudia’s shoulder, Myka’s and Helena’s gazes lock yet again, and it’s spectacular.

However: it also seems to introduce a foreign element into the hug, some friction that Claudia must sense, for she disengages and says, “So. I have to go. I just remembered I have an appointment to not be here.”

Steve says, “I feel like I was supposed to remember to meet you there, wasn’t I,” Steve says, and Myka has never been able to predict when he’ll be able to play along instead of blurting “lie” (even if he does often follow such blurts with some version of an apologetic “but I see the social purpose”).

“I don’t think you were,” Claudia says, “because I’m revising the gag; it makes more sense if I just now made an appointment to not be here. So you couldn’t be remembering some nonexistent-before-now appointment.”

“But I still think the appointment ought to be with me, gag-wise and otherwise,” Steve says, doggedly, still playing. “In the first and second place.”

“Is this the first place?” Claudia muses, faux-serious, now rewarding his doggedness. “Is the appointment in the second place?”

They could who’s-in-the-first-place this for days, so Myka intervenes, “In the first place, if this is a gag, it desperately needs workshopping. But in the second place: Scram!”

“You mean to the second place,” Claudia sasses.

Myka scowls, wishing she could growl proficiently.

 Claudia’s eyes widen. “Scramming. Best scrammer,” she says, sans sass, proving the actual growl unnecessary. Interesting.

“Except that’s about to be me with the gold-medal scram,” Steve objects and concurs.

Myka pronounces, “I’ll be the judge of who’s what. Once you actually do it.”

“You’ll award the medals later though, right?” asks Claudia. Her words are jokey, yet her tone is weirdly sincere, as if Myka might forget they had scrammed on her behalf, and that such amnesia would be hurtful.

“Participation trophies,” Myka semi-affirms, “in the form of a healthy breakfast.” She adds, internally, Take the damn hint.

After much winking and nudging, the comedians at last absent themselves, and Myka and Helena are alone.

Unfortunately that doesn’t immediately yield the perfected situation Myka seeks, first and foremost because she doesn’t know what comes next. Take your own damn hint, she tells herself, but... how? They need privacy, and the only reasonable place for that is where Helena’s suitcase rests: upstairs. Myka can’t magic them there, so what incremental movement will be recognizable as an appropriate beginning?

She casts a wish for Helena to ease it all, as she had with Claudia and Steve, but Helena is stock-still, offering no increment. For both of them, upstairs seems to have become a different place... the promised land?

Nothing is promised, she reminds herself. Some things are newly possible, but nothing is promised. Certainly not when the Warehouse is involved.

So maybe the point, probably the point, is that it’s incumbent on Myka and Helena to realize the possibility.

Nevertheless, here they stick.

After a time—most likely shorter than Myka feels it to be—Helena announces, “Pete and I have had a chat.” Her articulation of “chat” shapes it into a synonym for “fight.” “Who won?” Myka asks.

“I believe it was a draw. He opened by saying he ‘didn’t get how far along this thing had got.’” Hearing Pete’s diction in Helena’s mouth is disorienting. “He then said he wants to protect you.”

That’s so Pete. “I don’t need protecting.”

Eyebrow. “I noted that I want to protect you too.”

That thrills Myka. At the same time, she wants to object to it nearly as much as to Pete’s assertion... internal contradictions, what are they? She lands weakly on, “I hope that persuaded him.”

“Pete finds deeds more persuasive than words,” Helena says. “Thus I’m ‘on probation where Myka’s concerned,’ until he determines I won’t damage you.”

That’s so Pete too. But. “That is my determination.”

“I expressed a similar sentiment. He responded, ‘And how’d that go last time?’” Helena’s wince after she says this is awful, and Myka dares to assuage it, stepping toward Helena with open arms, drawing her into an embrace.

This time, their hug—simpler because its purpose is clear—works, bodies soft-querying at the start, then firm, intentional. Not quite catching fire, but this is a palpable first cut into whatever membrane of uncertainty is obstructing their movement.

Slow, slow, they move apart. Yet they stay close, the embrace’s softness lingering as Helena says, “Selfishly, I didn’t concede his point, which is in any case indeed down to your determination. But I did note that circumstances have changed since then. And to be fair I must report that he allowed they have.”

“You’re both right,” Myka says. But: “Was this Cleveland mission contrived to... further change the circumstances?”

“I didn’t contrive it,” Helena says, fast. “I would have, if I could, but I didn’t.”

“I’m not saying you did. I’m saying I always wonder, because I can’t help it, how much, or how little, of what happens just happens.”

“And the rest—or if I’m understanding your implication, the bulk—would be...?”

“Some sort of social engineering.”

“On whose part?” Helena asks.

That’s disingenuous. “Your engineers of choice. Regents. Mrs. Frederic. Mr. Kosan. Ententes thereof.”

Helena runs a hand through her hair—frustration at the thought of those entities? Or just showing off? Then she shrugs, as if to dismiss both possibilities. “I favor any engineering that places me in private proximity to you.”

The words are beyond welcome. And yet. “I’m not objecting to it. I’m just...”

“Objecting to it.”

“No. Questioning its provenance.”

“Why?”

That brings Myka up short. “What?”

“If it produces an outcome you desire, what does the provenance matter? In this case, at the very least.”

It’s a reasonable question, and Myka’s most-honest answer would have something to do with the ethical acceptability of poisonous-tree fruits. For now, though, she goes with, “Because I don’t like being manipulated.”

“Don’t you?” That’s flirty, a near-whisper, compelling Myka to lean even closer. Helena knows—she’s always known—the power she has over Myka. And she’s always known how—and when—to wield that power.

“The manipulator matters,” Myka says, responding to the flirt, accepting the push away from ethics.

“Then would that I could in truth say I contrived that relatively banal retrieval. And sabotaged the elevator, so as to draw our attention to... that to which it was drawn.”

“I can’t say I was displeased with the drawing,” Myka allows. “So if you had...”

Helena moves her lips, a sly hint of curve, and says, “Oh, but perhaps I’ve manipulated you into that sentiment.” Again, an ostentatious flirt.

Myka’s knowing that flirt-show for what it is? That’s Helena-specific. In the past Myka has always had to be told when she was being flirted with: “He was interested in you,” an exasperated friend would explain of an interaction Myka found incomprehensible, and she would cringe internally at her inability to recognize such an apparently basic, obvious display. But with Helena she’s never needed a flirt translator. From the first lock of gaze, unto this night’s myriad connections; from that first brush of finger, unto the way Helena has just allowed their hug to linger; from the first just-for-you conspiratorial grin, unto this very moment’s slip of smile—all the advances, heavy and light, have been legible to Myka.

And based on what she is now reading, she has no ground left. “Fine. I like being manipulated if it means.” She clears her throat. “If it means I get closer to you. You win.”

“Do I?” Here’s the disingenuity again, but now Myka understands its intentional irony. Helena follows up with, “This establishment has no elevator,” Helena says, like it’s nothing more than a structural observation that checks a box on a form, a minor note in an overall architectural assessment.

“No,” Myka agrees.

“How fortunate,” Helena says.

Myka waits for the conclusion, the help... but it’s not forthcoming, probably in a that’s-down-to-your-determination-as-well sense. The next cut is clearly Myka’s responsibility too. So: “It has stairs though,” she offers. “That go. Up. Well, both down and up. Of course. As stairs do.” Stop talking, she tells herself, but her nerves don’t heed the advice. “As they have to? I don’t know; do they? Escher?”

“Ess-sherr,” Helena echoes, clearly uncomprehending. That she lets Myka hear her knowledge gap is a gift. For Christmas?

“He’s an artist. I promise I’ll explain later. Eventually. Anyway the stairs. I think you just used them? Without incident?”

Myka expects a comeback. She gets none, which leaves her in some non-place, absent as it is of Helena-attitude... but what form had she expected such attitude to take? Aggression? Naughtiness? Or “naughtiness”... does the lack of all that mean Helena is offering a self more authentic than the one who charms and flirts? But that doesn’t seem quite right, for the charms and the flirts have always seemed clearly intrinsic Helena-talents. Deployed, yes, but not inauthentic. So if this Helena is deploying fewer such talents, maybe it’s that she’s... less?

Ironically—of course ironically, because all of this is so, so layered like that—a reduced Helena is an even greater bonus.

All of this, which Myka had better figure out, fast, how to appreciate and accommodate. “Of course that’s no guarantee that travel will go well,” she begins. “So we should try not to trip on the stairs... wait, no, that would make it our problem, which I don’t think this ever was. Maybe better: we shouldn’t let the stairs trip us.” She considers. “But no again: what I really mean is, we shouldn’t give the stairs a reason to trip us. Right?”

Helena looks at her and blinks, charmingly blank. “I have no idea. Are you through?”

“I have no idea either,” Myka admits, still directionless without Helena’s attitudinal lead. Is this, like the semi-botched hug of two days ago, a seemingly terrible sign?

“Merely delay.” A little head-shake follows. Signifying disappointment? Making light of Myka’s inability to get through? Then Helena says, “And yet I don’t know how much more delay I can withstand.”

Those raw words are mediated by nothing more than molecules—the nitrogen-oxygen-argon-et-cetera invisibilities conveying waves to Myka’s ossicles—and for the second time, Myka ideates, in full awe, She feels the same way I do.

“Me either,” she says, literally heartfelt, sending the words back, a final push through everything, molecules and otherwise, that has stood between them.

Testing, she offers Helena her hand. Helena takes it.

These hands together: not a first. Not even a second. In the present circumstance, that translates to something very like “comfortingly familiar.”

Under the aegis of that comfort, they ascend the stairs, Myka leading the way, marveling that she can. Against her pulling hand, Helena offers what seems a single erg of resistance, a display, an I-am-letting-you affirmation.

They cross the threshold of Myka’s room, and then. Then, after Myka makes one turn and twist, a closed non-elevator door stands, for once and at last, between them and the rest of the world.

Closed, the door is, but not locked. In the door-closing instant, turning the lock—adding its presumptive click—had struck Myka’s hand as overly brazen: that’s a frustrating flinch her hand will have to work out with whatever part of her brain-body complex was certain enough to start this, start it by saying what she did about the suitcase... the same part that keeps telling her that Helena’s feelings match hers.

As Myka turns her back on the now-closed door, she sees her bed. She sees her bed. Disconcerting, in this new now, how large a percentage of the room’s space this one piece of furniture seems to be occupying...

But she’s self-aware enough to know that she’s overlaying the bed’s current brain space, the desires it signifies, on the physical. Whatever’s going to happen—or not—will happen, she tries to force into that space in her brain, pushing it down... for desire, sometimes indistinguishable from expectation, has devastated her before. But she tries too hard: missing the mark, she slips and falls into some past-obsessed cerebral fold, once again lost, quietly but deeply, in that devastation.

“Here we are,” Helena remarks into the silence. “Or, harking back to engineering: Here we are? I continue to be unsure as to why. I can accept unclear provenance, but I’d prefer more explication regarding my allowable movements.”

That’s help. That’s rescue. But oh: movements. The word nearly derails Myka in a different direction, but she gathers herself, resetting to reply, “It’s explicable, but I honestly don’t have the energy to explicate even my minimal knowledge of the mechanism. The most basic base is, Claudia and Steve worked out a deal to use that pen, and there’s a list that you and I are on. As a ‘nice’ situation. Anyway if you want real details, you probably should sit down with Steve.”

A mind’s-eye image comes to her, of Helena and Steve leaning toward each other, bringing complementary concentration to bear on some topic large or small... and then an incipient sound strikes her: the chime of their voices together, both seriously and lightheartedly, ringing notes she hadn’t before this new instant thought to anticipate. “Actually I think you and Steve sitting down would be really pleasant. Even productive. Given that you’ll be sticking around. I mean, if you’re willing, and if, or at least until, some definitional issues get worked out. As I understand it.” As I devoutly hope, she doesn’t quite utter.

“That addresses... some issues, I suppose. Yet a question remains.”

This is a bonus of a day: Helena turning into the queen of understatement? It’s freeing; Myka laughs and says, “Tons of questions remain. Which one’s on your mind?”

Head-tilt. “You said you didn’t have the energy... to explain the mechanism,” Helena says.

More delay, Myka knee-jerks... but she knows the reflex immediately as wrongheaded, for this is conversation, the value of which she should have learned by now not to discount. “Right. Sorry, I’ll try: so the pen, and honestly speaking of questions and provenance, I still have some questions about provenance, which I’m trying to ignore, but anyway, Claudia found the file, and—”

“That is not the issue I had in mind.”

“Sorry. I’m not getting anything right, am I?” Because of course she isn’t getting anything right.

“We’ll see,” Helena says.

“So what did I jump the gun on?”

“You don’t have the energy to explain.”

This muddles Myka; it will probably require another reset. “I did say that, but I can try to—”

“Myka,” Helena says, and her name in that mouth will never cease to be a singular wonder. “What do you have the energy for?”

Here again is the difference between the attitude that Myka, in her more cynical moments, might have thought Helena would maintain, and the reality she is instead offering: the question is suggestive, but guilelessly, graciously so; its import is genuine, not manipulative. “How do you do that?” Myka asks.

“Do what?” This question, too, is guileless, gracious.

“Stop me.” It’s the best definition Myka can produce of what Helena has in fact done, what she seems consistently able to do.

Helena breathes several breaths, like she’s waiting for the right words to arrive... no, more like they’ve already arrived, but she’s preparing herself, gearing up to deliver them. “I don’t want to stop you,” she eventually says, and Myka should have used that windup to prepare herself: for the admission this is, for how this don’t-want utterance nevertheless is want.

They are the most vulnerable words Myka has ever heard.

New, new, new... the fact is that historically, people have tended to twist and shy from revealing weakness to Myka. Fallout from her tendency to judge, no doubt, but it means that this, too, is new: here is Helena, and maybe in some other world someone else might have made such a mattering move but here in this best one it’s Helena, Helena ignoring that character defect, Helena blowing past it for a chance to change everything.

Everything. “It’s Christmas,” Myka says, because it is. And because now it is.

“So give me this gift,” Helena rejoins.

“You too,” Myka says.

For the space of one breath, they both wait—bracing for whatever fate intends to use to stop them this time.

But this time nothing stops them, for in the ensuing instant, they both give that gift, blowing fast past everything that, slow, might stop them, grasping at this chance to change.

The jolt of their contact reminds Myka of—no: the shock of it strikes her as—artifact activation, that calling of vested power into being, that enabling of such longed-for release. Before the Warehouse taught her to recognize this transubstantiating, she would not have understood this moment’s raw unleashing, its summoning and compelling of stored potential to manifest as what it has lain in wait, in desperate wish, to become.

But also: all the blood in her body knows she has never felt such power released nonartifactually before now, before this.

Before this world-encompassing, world-creating first kiss.

“You’re thinking,” Helena murmurs into the space of a pause for breath. “I can taste it.”

“Sorry, sorry, sorry,” Myka scrambles, kicking herself for not staying in the unprecedented moment, for letting thought intrude, as she always does, and it’s always bad, and Helena is now rightfully offended and disenchanted and—

“It’s delicious,” Helena says, punctuating—proving—by meeting Myka’s lips again, again again again, as if determined to never stop.

Myka would be perfectly happy, oh so perfectly happy, with that forever-continuation, but something in her brain has begun gesturing wildly, demanding her attention... something about her hand... brazen... she rips her lips away and yelps, “Wait! I have to lock the door!”

“The thinking continues,” Helena says, stepping back, freeing Myka, and spreading her arms in a ta-da endorsement. “You’re brilliant.”

A memory: “Bunny, you think too much.” No I don’t, she can now answer. Not for her. In time, given time, she’ll tell Helena how much this matters, but now is not that time. Not when Helena is saying, “However, as we’re behind a locked door, I’ll wager I can make you stop thinking... for at least one consequential moment...”

To Myka’s extremely consequential—and utterly, blissfully unthinking—delight, Helena wins that bet.

****

Later. Lazily, later: “I genuinely cannot believe we were stuck in an elevator,” Myka says. A thing to say, said. “As the prelude to all this.” Which is what she really means.

Against Myka’s neck, newly and blessedly intimate, Helena says, “Your limited capacity for belief is noted. Are you equally incapable of believing that we had the apparently obligatory, if not preordained, chat?”

“Obligatory... preordained...” Myka is still so lazy, she’s practically drawling, and the out-of-character surprise of it pricks at the edge of her ability to stay in such a state. Stay, stay, stay... “Honestly... just clichéd.”

“And yet I was able to add a reference to my Myka-index. Entry: Mirrors, your artifact-related discomfort with.”

Myka’s heart seizes: Helena has a Myka-index. That, plus their proximity now, surely requires her to do better than the little falsehood she’d rested on with regard to the mirror-discomfort. Pushing laziness aside, with something too much like relief, she acknowledges, “I misled you. There was an artifact, but that isn’t what bothers me. The real thing is that mirrors make me observe myself too closely. Too much. Which I do all the time anyway.”

“I wish you’d delegate that observational task to me.” Sweet. Helena sounds so sweet. And not just sounds: Myka can tell (hopes she can tell) Helena means it. Which is even sweeter.

And which in turn entails a need for Myka to think seriously about being observed. Being protected. Being willing—but more important, able—to delegate in the correct spirit, even minimally. “I can try.”

“I can accept that,” Helena says, and the approval is better than sweet: it’s buy-all-the-books-you-want indulgent. “But I must ask: do you honestly think any part of the Cleveland interregnum was the elevator’s doing?”

The true answer references Myka’s entire Warehouse experience, from day one: “Yes and no.”

Helena nods, her hair sliding mink-soft on Myka. “I can accept that as well.”

“And whoever’s at fault, our chat was interrupted,” Myka says.

“As it was poised to progress beyond ‘chat’... but in truth I would rather this happened here than in an elevator. Better environs for still further progress. Don’t you agree?” Helena moves her unclad limbs against Myka’s, in transcendent emphasis.

Of course Myka agrees. Which leads her to a painful realization: “So maybe the elevator wasn’t as judgmental as I... judged it to be.”

Helena bestows a kiss to Myka’s shoulder—small, intimate—bringing Myka’s mind back, sharp, to what those bestowing lips have so recently accomplished, which threatens to render her again overcome. She shudders, which reduces her to embarrassment instead, but Helena is kind enough to feign obliviousness as she says, “You did note your own judgmental nature.”

Myka’s soul twinges in genuine regret, collapsing her lip-recall. She regrets that too. “Do you think I need to go back and apologize? I feel all guilty now.”

“The elevator has most likely moved on,” Helena says, quite dry.

“You’re saying it doesn’t have my memory.”

“I’m saying that even if it does—an open question, though the lack of elevator memoirs argues in the negative—it’s unlikely to care as much as you do about what it does remember.”

“Story of my life,” Myka sighs out. Now she’s really saying it, because memory, and caring too much about it, is that story.

“For the best, I suspect. Your life story and an elevator’s shouldn’t be entirely congruent, should they?” Helena questions, and that makes Myka laugh and want to read an entire library shelf’s worth of elevators’ memoirs. Feigning seriousness, Helena continues, “Although we might revisit so as to investigate whether its conveyance of Bob proceeded properly after our visit. That could be revealing.”

“Speaking of Bob, I feel bad for Nancy. Because of course he’ll blame her.”

“For elevator mischief?”

Ah. Helena doesn’t know. “For naughty.”

“Naughty what?”

“The list. He’s back on it, thanks to Steve and Claudia.”

“Is he.” Her satisfaction is evident, and for a moment she and Myka are one in their schadenfreude. That, too, is delicious. “Better they punish him than we do,” Helena then says.

This sends Myka back to guilt. “It feels like cheating. We didn’t use the artifact, but we get the personal gain.”

Myka’s shoulder now receives an indignant exhale. In its wake, Myka is dwelling on how she would have preferred another kiss, but Helena says, “I was speaking of soul-consequences, not this personal-gain fetish you all seem to embrace. Or perhaps it’s an anti-fetish, but in any case was no hard-and-fast dictum in my day.”

“I’ll reiterate that you should sit down with Steve,” Myka tells her, and Helena accedes with a nestle that erases the exhale.

Are words about such things—ambiguously motivated elevators, deserved punishments, fetishes of undetermined valence—a waste of time? No... for again, they are conversation... the value of which, Myka has lately learned, is even greater when the words it comprises land as soft breath on skin.

In fact Myka has learned a great many things in this locked-door recent while. There is, for one, the gratifying fact that she and Helena are physically compatible, at least as evidenced by this first performance, in terms both of wants and of abilities to satisfy them. But nearly as important, particularly in its physical component but not only that, is her new understanding that while her life has offered her several circumstances with which she’s been reasonably satisfied—that she hasn’t minded—this right-now is orders of magnitude above such contentment. She must have in some soul-stratum known this would prove true, or she would not have been panting in its pursuit so seemingly hopelessly, with such dogged desperation.

She says, with gratitude, “This is what I wanted.”

Getting what she wants: that, too, is new. And very. very nice.

“I would hope so,” Helena says. As if she had some genuine doubt about Myka’s motivation? “No, that’s rhetorical; rather, I did hope so. You’ve realized that hope, and... well. I should be clear: this is more than I dared to want.”

Myka, endeavoring to bring everything together, says, “So what you’re saying, want-wise, is that it’s a bonus. A nice one.”

“I’m saying, want-wise, that my wildest hopes have been exceeded. Surpassed. Transcended.”

It’s something, that reply. Also more than a little over the top, rhetorically, which Helena obviously knows. “Pleonast,” Myka accuses.

Helena laughs. “Not inaccurate. I suppose your ‘nice bonus’ translation is technically correct, if a bit... with apologies, pedestrian?”

“It’s less pedestrian than ‘Fred,’” Myka says. A “hm?” from Helena reminds Myka that she hasn’t yet made that translation evident. “I guess ‘Fred’ counts as esoteric instead, so never mind. You’re right, ‘bonus’ is pedestrian. So is ‘nice.’ But maybe it’s a good idea to call our whatever-it-is something pedestrian. I don’t want to scare it away.”

“And what precisely do you think would ‘scare it away’?”

“Bigness,” Myka offers, weakly. It’s what she means, but—

“‘Bigness?’” Helena says, quotes evident. “From the woman who so recently deployed ‘pleonast’? Should I fear that you’ll regularly revert without warning to Pete-reminiscent locutions?”

Myka chuckles. “Spend enough time with him, it’ll probably happen to you too.” The laziness is back. Earned back?

After a time—or perhaps Myka only after a time processes the sound—Helena says, “God forbid.”

A further lag ensues before Myka manages to respond, with a drowsy “I agree.”

Sleep follows. That is certainly earned.

****

Consciousness resumes for Myka with a banging on her door and a shout from Pete: “It’ s really not Christmas anymore, because Artie’s back!”

“Being Artie about it!” Claudia shouts in addition. “He says get to work!”

“I’m awake,” Myka says as she becomes more fully so. This is a Warehouse morning, and Warehouse alarms ring as they do.

Then: I’m not awake; I’m dreaming, because the back of Helena’s head and her naked shoulders greet Myka’s opening eyes. That’s a bracingly new alarm.

Helena’s voice comes next. “He says get to work,” she quotes, playfully, and Myka would be willing to wake to such an alarm with joy for the rest of her life.

But assuredly, if the content of that alarm is the dictate, then no one is dreaming. There’s really nothing for Myka to say except, “Sorry, but one more time: Story of my life.”

“Now? Our life,” Helena corrects.

That is a literally life-story-altering assertion, and a self-deprecating impulse tempts Myka to scoff it away. Behind that impulse, however, lies a clear-eyed recognition that she must meet what Helena has said. How, how, how...

...and then her mind starts fully working. She begins to formulate a plan. One that will, if possible, manifest her gratitude, but also, display her difference from the Myka she used to be, that one from so few hours ago, who had not yet known the dream-surprise of this awakening’s sight.

“I’m going to tell them I can’t get the door unlocked,” she says. Steve isn’t there. She can get away with it. She sits up, ready to head for the door and tell that story.

Helena touches Myka’s shoulder. “Would it lend credibility for me to suggest out loud that I genuinely can’t believe we’re stuck in your bedroom?” More play, but the touch is becoming a don’t-leave-this-bed grasp.

Myka leans to kiss the restraining hand. “I think that would make them think you planned it. And were being nefarious about it. Shocked incredulity isn’t really your strong suit.”

“It’s true that my capacity for belief outstrips yours.” She pulls down on the sheet, exposing both her body and Myka’s.

Talk about overdetermined. Or is it, in this as-yet-unmapped terrain, underdetermined? To be determined later, if at all... Myka somehow marshals sufficient will to rise from the bed, while telling herself that she is not, conceptually at least, actually leaving it. At the door, she fiddles with the lock, expressing frustration to support her claim, after which Pete and Claudia make noises about toolboxes and battering rams, respectively, and then mercifully depart.

“They’re going to try to get us out,” Myka reports as she returns to bed. “Maybe violently?”

“Let them,” Helena murmurs. “That elevator and its manifestation of mischief... comparatively amateur. You’ve bested it handily.”

That jolts Myka out of a back-of-mind consideration of whether she might be able to jam the bedroom door’s lock with something easily to hand, or perhaps whether her dresser might be pushed across the room to block the door entirely. She then considers, front of mind, the possibility that Helena—her physical presence, her physical provocation—is a bad influence... or at the very least a naughty one... for these thoughts are so, so out of character.

“That, on the other hand, is not the story of my life,” Myka says, and the fact of it does make her more than a little nervous.

“A new chapter,” Helena counters, reading Myka’s mind and setting it right—in three words. Such economy.

****

Myka and Helena are engaged in adding to that new chapter (or at the very least, drafting a steamy interlude of same, even if it isn’t essential to the plot) when a banging on the door interrupts them yet again. As does shouting: “We’re back!” yells Pete, unnecessarily.

“Hey, Myka, what’s going on?” That’s Steve. Far more quiet.

“I brought Steve,” Pete says, also unnecessarily.

“I gathered that from his voice,” Myka notes.

“But!” Pete says, in aha-I-got-you mode, “what if it turns out all I brought was his voice?”

“Then I guess he’d still be here in some sense?” she says; she’s thinking on the Helena-hologram, on what a lack of visual might have meant, on how a more ontologically disembodied voice would have made her believe Helena was there, there but standing on the other side of a door. How she would have wanted to take her own battering ram to that door. The hologram’s present non-presence had stranded her, stranded them, in a strange shared space, offering no barrier Myka could use her body to break violently through.

“But!” Claudia exclaims, jokey, fighting with Myka’s ache of reminiscence, “what if it’s just me, doing my Steve impression?”

“That’d be a different thing,” Myka concedes.

“You do a me impression?” Steve asks Claudia.

Who exhales so dramatically, Myka’s surprised the door doesn’t just blow open. “You have stood next to me while I did it.”

“I have?” Puzzled-Steve is honestly Myka’s favorite Steve.

“Are we not a team?” Claudia demands. “Myka does a Pete. Pete does a Myka. Naturally they both suck, but the point is, why don’t you do a me?”

“Because you’d kill me?”

“Guys,” Pete says, “this isn’t getting Myka and H.G. out of the bedroom.”

Claudia says, “But let me just. Myka, H.G., you guys do impressions of each other, right?”

Helena raises her arms, a gesture of observe-this!—or maybe it’s at-last!—and exclaims, “I feel compelled to express disbelief about this circumstance!”

It takes Myka a second to get it, but once she does, she shouts, “I love blooming onions!”

For quite some time, there’s silence from the other side of the door.

Then Steve says, “Am I the only one who’s extremely confused?”

“Usually, yes,” Claudia says. “Except now, no. I’m with you. Pete?”

“Myka loves blooming onions,” Pete says, slow; he’s the one having trouble now with belief. Myka can picture his gobsmacked face. “There’s my endless wonder for the day. Also, I gotta rethink a whole lot of stuff she said about what she was willing to eat.”

Myka presses an apologetic kiss to Helena’s lips (and how nearly unbelievable it is to feel comfortable with such a touch being swift, to not need to hoard, to believe there will be more), then extricates herself yet again from the sheets, the bed. She heads for the door: to make a show of unlocking it, to send them away temporarily so she and Helena can reassemble themselves to rejoin the world—but. Problem. Big problem. “Guys. I really can’t get the door unlocked now.”

“‘Now’?” Pete echoes.

“You mean you actually could before?” Claudia asks.

Moment of truth. So, fine, truth: “I didn’t actually try before.”

“Ha!” Claudia barks. “Are we still on impressions? That might’ve been a decent one, for real, because the attitude? Way H.G.”

“Thank you so much!” Helena chirps.

“H.G.,” says Claudia, with a whiff of pedantry—and that she feels free to express such an attitude toward Helena is most likely because she’s on the safe side of a closed door—“I was complimenting Myka’s impression.”

“But in it, you recognized my attitude.” Helena’s words are a full preen, and as she speaks, she’s rising from the bed, approaching Myka, slipping arms around her, such that Myka loses her ability to track what’s happening on the other side of the door, even as splinters of sound catch in her ears—“hinges inside,” “lock plate solid,” and finally, “break it down”—whereupon she realizes anew that neither she nor Helena is clothed, and that being caught and seen in that state will constitute a disaster that outstrips a great many of the others in her experience.

“We have to get dressed,” she breathes at Helena.

“Wait,” Helena says. “I suspect a realization is about to occur.”

At times, Helena can be eerily prescient. But what is it this time?

As if in answer, Claudia says, “I have a really depressing theory. Myka, can you get the window open?”, whereupon Myka understands Helena’s deduction: this isn’t mechanical; it’s artifactual. More specifically, list-artifactual.

She cannot open the window.

“Yeah,” Claudia says, a defeated I-knew-it. “I’d be all ‘try to smash it!’, but since I can’t see you try it and, like, bounce off the glass, what’s the point? I mean, go for it if H.G. wants the lulz.”

“I don’t know what that means!” Helena informs her. That too is a chirp, and Myka’s pleased to note it’ll probably head off the slapstick.

“Kind of a shame,” Claudia says, but with a drag, like she’s picturing it, and Myka is less pleased to have to devoutly hope that picturing involves everybody fully clothed. “Anyway I hate to say it, but it’s pretty clear this is on us, the list-makers.”

Pete groans. “You were supposed to check it twice! It’s right there in the song!”

“Listen, we seriously argued about the wording,” Steve says.

“And oh guess what!” Claudia says, defeat apparently tabled for the moment. “Everybody in the world is going on about their day as usual due to the unshocking news that I was right.”

“No, I was right. I was the one who said ‘proximity’ was likely to be too vague,” Steve says.

Myka’s inclined to agree with him.

“Bro, I was,” Claudia says, “because I said it was likely to be not vague enough.”

Well. Now Myka’s inclined to agree with Claudia.

She sees the conundrum. “I appreciate it either way,” she says, and that quiets the combatants.

“Regardless, we obviously need different wording,” Steve diplomats.

“I think our first mistake was thinking an artifact would word like we thought it should. You need to get more into its head than you did before.”

“I was in a hurry before,” Steve says, a little less diplomatically. “Because you were yelling at me.”

“I am so so so so glad,” Pete hosannas, “that none of this is on me.”

Myka cannot let that stand. “Who gave his cousin a thing?”

A pause. Then, “Whoops,” Pete says, very sad-clown.

Later, she’ll thank him again, but for now, she doesn’t mind having wielded this little shiv, inflicting this little nick, so he’ll remember that there is, or should be, always a downside.

“How fortunate they’re not asking for our help,” Helena says, bringing her back to the upside.

“Who’s better with words though? You certainly are,” Myka says.

“You hold your own, Ms. ‘Pleonast.’ But ssssh. Don’t remind them.”

“We’ll fix it, we promise!” Claudia says.

“Don’t feel compelled to hurry!” Helena directs, cheerily.

Steve says, “I think she means ‘Don’t yell at Steve this time.’” His hopefulness is clear.

“He isn’t wrong,” Helena notes into Myka’s ear.

Pete announces, “I think she means bow chicka wow wow.”

“He isn’t either,” Myka notes back. “Even less so?”

Helena answers by kissing her with intent.

Claudia snorts. “I think no matter what she means, Artie’s gonna kill us.”

“Alas, the least wrong of all,” Helena grants with a sigh.

The wrecking crew’s voices fade, and they may still be making non-wrong statements, but for Myka and Helena there is at last, again, peace. And once Myka pulls Helena back to bed—a delectable spin she is now bold enough to put on their dynamic—there is at last again not-peace.

Lazily later—and these lazy laters are vying to be Myka’s favorite at-last—she says, “Not to overinterpret the artifact’s thinking, but this feels very nice. As an in-proximity situation.”

“This particular proximity seems more than a bit naughty, however,” Helena says, incongruously matter-of-fact. She isn’t wrong. “Pete obviously made an inference to that effect. Perhaps if Steve and Claudia can use that as a way of writing us out of the current situation.”

“I’m sure that’s for the best,” Myka says, with no small amount of regret, first attached to her embarrassment at Pete, Steve, and Claudia’s involvement in that inference, but even more due to the sad fact that this beginning must come to an end.

“Are you...” Helena’s words are a smile.

“No. I’d much rather stay here forever with you.” Her practical side then takes over, as even Helena’s body twined around hers can’t prevent. “But if they don’t fix it we’ll die—pretty soon, unless they can figure out how to get food in.”

“Would the artifact allow us to starve? That seem the antithesis of a situation that might be termed ‘nice.’”

“‘Termed’? Isn’t problematic terminology why we’re still here?”

“Granted. But of course we’ll die regardless.”

The casual, literal fatalism trips Myka up. She temporizes, “The artifact might have something to say about that,” placeholding, as she finds her way to a real response: “But artifact aside... will you though?” It’s a question about... well, about whether Helena is, for want of a better word, real. Speaking of terminology. “Die,” she adds, not as a word she must expel, for its terrible taste, but one she feels a need to place. As a marker.

Helena takes a moment. Before, Myka would have read that pause as censure; it would have pushed her overboard into I-have-overstepped agony. But the plates have shifted, and her footing feels—strange but nice (oh, nice!)—sure.

The answer, when it comes: “Here with you, I don’t want to be bronzed again. So yes.”

That leaves Myka warm, yet shaking her head. “I honestly don’t know a lot about romance.”

“Don’t you?” Helena asks, all of her limbs beginning to move again against all of Myka’s.

Which, for the moment, Myka resists: “So I’m not sure if it’s weird that I find it incredibly romantic for you to have said yes to dying.”

Now Helena’s smile is a smile; she rears away, back and up, showing Myka her face’s full measure of delight. “Weird or no, whatever you find romantic, I’m inclined to approve. If that’s acceptable to you.” Helena bows her head, as if to formally request Myka’s benediction.

The very idea of such an ask floods her with happy tenderness. “Is it okay for me to find that romantic too?”

“‘Okay’ seems a sadly weak word to convey the extent of my approval,” Helena says. “Further, I find it romantic for you to ask my permission to find any thing romantic. Unnecessary, yet romantic. Is that ‘okay’ as well?”

“It’s a relief,” Myka understates. “Can I call it a romantic relief?”

“I don’t see why not. However, to what extent is it romantic, or non-, that we seem to be finding—or placing—ourselves in recursive loops of romantic-allowable querying?” Helena accompanies this academically focused, seemingly serious question with yet more limb movement.

Myka is actively in bed with someone who’s questioning the romantic quotient of recursive loops of romantic-allowable querying. It is a level of “nice” that she could never ever have ideated on her own. “I genuinely cannot believe any of this,” she says.

“I can assure you that I will be taking some time—if allowed, and thus perhaps only in an ideal world, some great length of time—to determine whether your incredulity will ever cease to be tedious and elevate itself to ‘romantic.’ Some great length of time,” she repeats, playfully.

Myka knows Helena’s appreciation for time’s length is far greater than any ordinary individual’s... so this smacks of a promise. Myka’s gratitude rises, as does her willingness to pursue any and all romantic activity, despite her apparently romance-dampening incredulity... but then the limbs pause. “However,” Helena says.

“What’s this ‘however’?” Myka asks, now selfishly impatient.

Helena has, obviously and of course, heard and felt the impatience. Myka’s neck receives a press of lips, a curve of smile. “However: fortunately, at this juncture, belief isn’t required. Participation, on the other hand, is. So?” This is something Myka has always suspected was a Helena tactic, but here in intimacy she recognizes as true: challenge not for its own sake, but as an attitude in which to wrap something different, deeper, some authenticity Helena isn’t fully willing, or doesn’t quite yet know how, to express.

Myka moves her own limbs, her limbs that are even longer than, and just as flexible as, Helena’s. She moves them against Helena’s. She cannot believe she is doing so; nevertheless, she is. She is participating.

She places a chock under this particular incredulity, for unlike facts, the quality of emotions can escape her if she doesn’t consciously tie them down. She paints the word “bonus” on the emotion-wheel as she secures it, to ensure she elevates that felt quality too. Then she eases herself back to the full experience of the physical, this smooth beauty—and that is the word for every touch-heat-rise their bodies execute—that she and Helena together are creating... are enjoying.

She sighs soft against Helena’s neck; in return, Helena offers again her lips-on-skin smile.

They are participating. In this. Together. Lips on skin.

“So,” Myka agrees.

END

[auroreliis]

Introduction!!!

Hiii :D I'm Aurora, but most people call me Rorii!! I use she/her pronouns!!!

First of all, I recommend staying away from my page if you're under 16. Perhaps not all of my posts include 18+ topics, but some do and I really, REALLY don't want anyone under 16 interracting with my content (I'm also quitte iffy about people under 18 viewing my content, but I suppose I can't really stop you if you think that you can handle it...).

I need to clarify that English is not my mother tongue, so please forgive any errors :')

I mainly use this blog to share my thoughts and ideas!!! BUT I am veryyyy insistent on making sure that my posts are correct (okayyyy I may not always succeed, but still), so I might take a bit longer to post simply because I'm making sure that everything makes sense ;D

Other times, I will be offline for weeks at a time, because I have no inspiration :'(

That being said, I try my best, but my schedule is all over the place...sorry <3

Some more info about me!! My favourite band ever are Arctic Monkeys <3 Also, I am a bit of a yapper, so hopefully I will be forgiven if I ever go on and on about something <3 Also also, purple and red are my favourite colours!!!

I easily hyperfixate on things (and I bet you can't guess what it is now...)

I often play video games when I am free and my favourite ones EVER are Little Nightmares and Hitman!! Though Fields of Mistria and Stardew Valley might as well be on the list too.

When I am not playing video games, then I am watching hour-long video essays <3

I often read books before going to bed, mostly classics, but not exclusively <3

Oh also! Sleeping is my favourite way to pass time :)

My Ask-Box is always open!!! (And I swear, I try my best to answer everything :')...)

If you did send an ask and haven't recieved a reply yet, it's likely because I have not enough inspiration to make a good post about your ask. However, as soon as inspiration strikes me, I will write and write and write!!!

Frequently asked Questions!!!!

Q: What fandoms do you write for? A: Any fandom that I am currently interested in, so feel free to request and recommend me various media that you would like to see from me...however, DC has had a lot of power over me lately...

Q: Is there any topic you won't write about? A: A few come to mind, like extreme kinks and fetishes (age play, scat/pee/vomit play, non-con, etc.). However, if it is anything super niche or specific, feel free to ask me!

Q: Do you have any side blogs or other socials? A: For now, I have no side blogs, however, I have a secret AO3 account!! Let me know if you think you've found it ;D

Masterlist!!!

Yes, I finally have a masterlist. I've tried to compile EVERYTHING on here and will try to update regularly:

Masterlist

That would be all for now :)

Thanks for reading this <3

[reikiajakoiranruohoja]

W5 critical: Absence is not inclusivity

Critical of Werewolf the Apocalypse 5th edition, please don't read if you like the edition.

Few weeks ago, I saw a post stating that the removal of the cultural ties from (almost) all of the tribes is a good thing, because it means anyone can now be a member of any tribe.

What this mentality misses, however, is that the absence of culture is not the same as being inclusive. Sure, everyone can be anything, but from my experience, that freedom does not result in actual diverse depiction. After all, we have data that you can be as diverse as you want in your character creation options, most players will still make a white brown-haired cismale character.

In the same vein, all of the released adventures for W5 have been set in the US. Even though anyone can be anything, we have fallen back to treating the US as the default setting. Paradox is a Swedish company and Sweden has plenty of stories that fit WtA. This is no longer the case of a US company writing for a US audience.

What is worse, now that there are no specific tribes from Turtle Island, they don't have to be included in the stories set on their own lands. Instead, all characters can be white and the ST doesn't have to consider how the native people of the land see the white characters.

Even though the Legacy books often fell on their face when it came to depicting anything not a WASP American, the presence of cultural ties had a purpose.

Garou are creatures of community, they are people who band together not out of desperation or survival but because they like to have people around them. Unlike Vampire the Masquerade, Werewolf the Apocalypse is about honesty. Garou want friends, they want allies and a family without ulterior motives.

What this means is that each tribe was not just a group selected by a specific patron. They were communities of shifter and kin who all shared a culture and had for generations. A tribe is a garou's support network, their source of history and so on.

Of course, Werewolf the Forsaken's tribes aren't culturally tied. But the difference between the W5 tribes and those of The Moon is that there are only 8 or so base tribes and even then three of those are the 'bad guys'. The tribes in Forsaken are archetypes, werewolves of similar goals. But the game has always made a point that there are cultural differences depending on the country and there are plenty of lodges that are local to a specific area.

In W5, you have 11 tribes that were originally built to have ties to certain culture or broad concepts. Now, with most of the context removed, there are multiple tribes in W5 that could be cut and the setting would not change.

More than that, the tribes of W5 (aside from Cult of Fenris for some reason) are alone. Even the Uratha in Forsaken need to have contact with their potential tribe to join one, but in W5 the tribe patrons simply choose a fitting garou with no input from others of the tribe. This loneliness is further shown in how little thought is dedicated to a pack having a patron. Unlike every other WtA book, W5 does not come with a list of patrons. Instead the book, in a sidebar, recommends picking a tribal patron among the tribes of the pack. With an added mention to do contrition to other patrons who did not get picked. Even then, each PC is still expected to follow their tribal patron's ban on top of their pack patron's.

Meanwhile, in Legacy, the ties to various real life cultures give direction and community to the garou. When the pack chooses a patron, that patron is often not from any tribal brood. The pack, in Legacy, is important.

In W5, community, pack, family and all that are not only gone but also treated as the source of the garou's evils. Better be alone, better be without roots, it says.

No person is an island, yet that is what W5 wants things to be.

[riansdiary]

Answering last asks in my inbox 🎀

Hi my dearest gentle readers 💎

I'm answering all of my remaining asks here in this post because I didn't wanna leave anyone hanging. My asks will be temporarily closed due to me taking a break and focusing on my desires first. I will be back after making myself feel better! I'm just taking a long break because I don't wanna over consume on Tumblr so I'm not really gonna be that active at all. I'm only gonna be here to chat with my friends and post any epiphanies I have about the law of assumption! I also wanna complete myself like pour into my cup first before I pour into other's cups. I'm focusing on manifesting my most important desires. I'm currently still brainstorming and having epiphanies from time to time and I think I just need to hone my manifesting ability until I've found the best thing to do that works for me. Yes, I'm already good at it but I'm an overachiever since I was in school so I'm planning to understand the law better and make my methods even more effective! I'm studying the law not with books but with my own experiences.

Watch out for a post this week or the next week! I have a much better epiphany for you! I realized this new epiphany as I was manifesting for myself. I realized that I have the wrong Pov or mindset when I was doing it. This new one was a game changer for me! I have never wavered again after I wrote down this epiphany and realization I had about loa! I'm so excited to share this soon with everyone!

Ask #1:

I'm sorry but I'm not really the right person to go to. I don't know a lot about the void state and haven't tried it yet because I've been manifesting quite well on my own so I felt like I didn't need it. I would suggest that you go to someone like @therealitysculptor because if I remember correctly they do have void posts.

Ask #2:

I've seen you ask someone else for this. Oh I think it's @therealitysculptor

Just searched for it on her blog and I completely agree with her answer so I'll insert that here.

Anytime you manifest, it will always end up materializing anyway so why focus heavily on the 3d? I would recommend doing umbrella affirmations that imply that you have it now both in the 4d and 3d.

"It's done. I already have everything that I want."

"Everything in my life is perfect"

"I always get what I want"

"Everything is always working in my favor"

"It has manifested. I have it now."

Ask #3:

This is another familiar one and I have been seeing other bloggers answer this. I'm sorry but I don't really get the question. Do you want everyone to have a crush on you or just the two SP's? There's no desire that's unrealistic if you believe in it.

Ask #4:

You can listen to a moving to your desired country subliminal to help you along with manifesting that! I recommend reading Neville's Barbados success story!

Here is something I read that might help you!

Replace Barbados with the country you wanna move to so you could understand better.

Ask #5:

Hi! Yes, you can manifest any SP that you like. Reality is malleable and you can change anything about them from bad to good. Just don't focus on things about the SP that you do not like. Change that thing to something good. My boyfriend did not know me before so yes, it's possible to manifest someone who doesn't really notice your existence. About the partner thing, this is only what I've heard from loa coaches. If you want something then it's meant for you but personally I don't really have that experience of manifesting someone who already has a partner so you might have to ask other loa bloggers.

Ask #6:

You have to remember that whatever you think is an affirmation so if you're saying that to yourself then you should stop doing that. You decide which thoughts you give power or attention to. Please stop paying attention or focusing on things that you don't want. That's my number one rule about the 3d. Instead of that, just remind yourself that you have your results and be in the state of the wish fulfilled a.k.a living in the end. I always remind myself that I already have my subliminal results so I listen to subliminals fully relaxed knowing I have my results.

Whenever you think about your results just remind yourself gently, "I have my full results, there's nothing to worry about. It's done." and when you say this, I want you to actually consider it done and relax. Persist and assume that you have your results already regardless if you see it or not. Focusing on the lack is not really good for you. It made me mad, angry and anxious when I kept noticing the lack. So I made a decision that I have my desires. I always say "I have all my desires, it's in my reality. It's done." then I would relax in the knowing that it's done. That was always how I manifested quickly. It's when I left the seed I planted alone and watered (reminded/affirmed/decided) it whenever I think about it.

Don't check for results, that's the tip that I've been told about subliminals. Usually, subliminal makers would say that you need to listen for two months to get full results. You can listen to that or you could hear my advice. I want you to listen to your subliminals and don't think against it. Just listen to them and completely detach. All you need to do is listen to them and let it work/let it do its thing. Listen and let it happen. Forget that you even listened to them. It will help you to forget about that, assume you have results now and not think negatively about it. If you do that, you're just working against yourself. Don't be in the way of yourself getting results. Assume that you have your results now and make sure not to check for the results all the time. It's like you're asking it where the results are and the subliminal just says "I have silky hair"

Checking for results is literally contradicting what the subliminals are saying to your subconscious mind. It's like sabotaging yourself and your results. It's better to relax and just assume you have it now. Think the things that the subliminal would tell your subconscious mind. What I mean is to align your thoughts with the subliminals you're listening to. For example, you're listening to a specific hair subliminal. Instead of checking and still focusing and complaining about how you don't like how your hair looks, don't check and just think thoughts that align with what you actually want which is what your hair subliminal is saying. Focusing on time is not really good as well so stop marking the time and how much you're listening to it. Just keep listening and persisting! If it has worked for me and so many others then it will work on you too!

Ask #7:

First of all, the only one stopping your daydreams from being real is you. Imagination is the real reality. That is what I always heard when it comes to the law of assumption and it's true. The only difference is you're seeing these daydreams as a far-off impossible dream and all you need to do to change that is yes, remember them as the past or a memory! Just tell yourself that it happened and accept it as the truth.

Ask #8:

In the back of mind ik that I can manifest easily or once I want to/start manifesting, it will be easy for me. But I'm ALWAYS worried about failure, what if I fails? I would never be able to trust in abilities again, i would spiral sooo much. I have fear of failure 😔 that's the biggest reason of my procrastination too😭😭

That's because you're giving power and your attention to failure. Whatever you focus on, you will get more of it. Stop focusing on failure because it will give you just more failure. Instead of that, why don't you focus on your success stories? Worrying means you're not in the state of having it. You either have it or you don't. Failure helps us learn when it comes to the law, trust me. I've been having amazing epiphanies when I look at what I'm failing at or what I need to improve on or what I'm doing wrong. It always helped me to brainstorm to find out what is the better thing to do for me. I think you would manifest better with commanding your subconscious mind method which is one of my favorite techniques. You just need to command your subconscious and trust that it will do that for you but you need to relax to do that. That might suit you better. For example: "Subconscious mind I command you to make me have my desired hair." Just say that in your mind and trust that it's gonna get that for you/it's being carried out by your subconscious mind. All you need to do is relax and make yourself busy doing something you love.

I had a fear of failure too but my love for myself and the desire to make me and the people I love happy was bigger than that so I made a decision to stop acknowledging that. Try relaxing and doing what makes you happy in between applying the law of assumption. It will help you relax in the knowing that it's done.

Ask #9:

Hi, I was wondering how can I get started on manifesting and how I can make my crush notice me back with the advice ❤️

Here are helpful links that will help you learn about the basics of the law of assumption! Some of them are videos, one of them is a post! I also included a video about manifesting an SP.

💎 💎 💎 💎 💎

Stick to the basics. All you need to do is to assume that he always looks at you and notices you all the time. Don't focus on the 3d because that is letting the old story stay. Make sure to remember that you're not trying to manifest, you're not manifesting, consider what you want a reality now and remind yourself that it's done.

[plutodetective]

I have to work today, but there’s a lot I want to say about Jonathan and gender, and I won’t have the time to organize it in a proper essay, so here are some points:

1) Of fucking course men can have characteristics usually attributed to women and still be men. I’m working on a series of sci-fi adaptations of fairy tales, and in my Sleeping Beauty the protagonist is a (cisgender) boy, precisely because I want boys to see they can be vulnerable and need rescue too. And I completely understand if someone prefers to see Jonathan as a cis man because it’s so rare to see men in this role, surviving abuse, when it does happen in real life. I start my Gothic Heroine Support Group fic with Belle making precisely this point. Men can be prey, women can be predators. She knows this because that’s what happened to the original Beast, and kudos to Gabrielle Suzanne de Villeneuve, the author of the original Beauty and the Beast, for making this point centuries ago.

2) That being said, Jonathan seems to identify with women on a deeper level than being on a role in which women usually are. For me, what cements the headcanon is when he chooses the women’s quarters to sleep in, seeming to long for “a gentle life”, even if it involved sadly waiting for the menfolk to return from war. He seems to identify with the female identity, not only the female role. That’s only my personal interpretation, I fully acknowledge that. But seeing as it’s one that a lot of trans people in the fandom seem to share and, more importantly, to identify with, it’s one that is more than valid: it brings people joy. I’m cis. I’m also bisexual, and I know the joy of seeing myself in a character through subtext, and also how frustrating it is when people say it’s not true because it’s not 100% explicit in the text. If trans people are telling me they identify with Jonathan, I believe them and I take that as there being reasons I acknowledge I cannot fully understand why Jonathan is potentially a trans woman.

3) I assume everyone here has heard of Joseph Campbell’s The Hero’s Journey. But it’s less likely that everyone has heard of Gail Carriger’s The Heroine’s Journey. I fully recommend this book to everyone. But the point she makes is that whether someone is a “hero” or a “heroine” according to hers and Campbell’s analysis doesn’t depend on their gender. Women can follow Campbell’s Hero Journey, and men can follow Carriger’s Heroine Journey. And non-binary people can follow either. The names come from the gender of the characters who originated the archetypes, with Campbell’s being classic Greek heroes, and Carriger’s being ancient world goddesses. With that in mind, although no one has written a “Gothic Heroine’s Journey”, Jonathan Harker is a gothic heroine, regardless of whether you see him as cis man or trans woman, because he follows that story type step by step.

4) Does anyone here know of a transgender gothic heroine (in the gender neutral sense explained above)? Because I don’t. If anyone does, seriously, please point me their way, I’d love to increase my gothic knowledge. But it’s a type of representation I’ve never seen. As a member of a lot of minorities, I feel very happy whenever I see any of them represented in ways I’ve never seen before, and I can only imagine it’s the same for trans people. So what’s the harm in letting Jonathan be that? Seriously. All that is missing so far from Jonathan being a fully classical gothic heroine is him going around the castle in a flowing white dress. If I ever get to adapt my written version of modern day!Dracula, I’ll absolutely put Natália (my version of Jonathan) in a white nightgown, just to give a transgender actor the chance to play out this scene that I’ve seen so many cis women do over the years. Again, I understand if someone takes empowerment from Jonathan as a cis man surviving abuse, and I’d never want to take that away from them. Jonathan being a cis man is an absolutely valid reading too. But I think trans women deserve empowerment too, deserve to see a trans woman playing out a story so many of their cis counterparts have always had. The book is in public domain. We can each adapt them the way we choose. Cis man Jonathan and trans fem Jo, Natália, or whatever name you prefer for her, can coexist and be important to the groups of people each of them are important to. 

[thesophistiicate]

Do you have any uplifting, inspirational, books you’d recommend for bettering yourself and just overall better state of mind? Really feel like I’m going through it and being such a sensitive person, it’s hard for me to not let it drain me and have me crying all the time feeling hopeless in general

i’m so sorry to hear you’re going through a hard time 🤍 personally i find books about my passions are what really help me find my way out of darkness. i love books by writers on the topic of reading and writing, and reading or re-reading one like that helps me focus on passion in life. so whatever your passion or interests i highly recommend seeking out books on those topics.

as a sensitive person if you’ve never read ‘the highly sensitive person’ by elaine n aron it’s worth reading. there is some debate online around “you’re not highly sensitive you’re just neurodivergent” but i don’t find those ideas mutually exclusive, and it’s a nice book to learn how to feel connected to your sensitive nature.

in the “self help” type category to bring back motivation and focus, i don’t mind the work of brené brown (i like daring greatly or dare to lead). if you feel you need more of a kick, mel robbins. but i don’t often read books of this type.

i realised checking my book shelves my taste probably leans more toward depressing so i’m sorry i couldn’t be more help 🥲 if anyone has suggestions please share!

take care of yourself and i hope things start feeling better for you soon 🤍

[lunarleonardo]

Ok, quick question, do you have an idea for how long you want Love Letter to be? Because I genuinely need a vague idea of how long it's going to be until the comfort because IM DYING. I NEED A RESOLUTION, PLEASE. YOU DONT EVEN HAVE TO TELL ME WHAT YOU'VE PLANNED OR ANYTHING, JUST AN APPROXIMATE ESTIMATE FOR HOW MANY CHAPTERS THE FIC WILL BE. I don't usually read stuff this gruesome, so I'm like suffering right now because of my own dumbassness because I need a happy ending. I'm slowly dying from the suspense. I eat your content up every time, and like out of the maybe 4 or 5 fics you recently have made on the saiouma tag, I've only recently realized you wrote them all. YOU WERE LITERALLY THE SAME PERSON AND I WAS JUST SHOCKED. (How are they pumping these out left and right?? What type of stuff do they think about to come up with this stuff? How do they stay so serious when writing?)<- genuine thoughts I had a few weeks ago. ANYWAYS, keep up the good work. I'll be waiting in dread until the comfort comes, but I'll still be eating the love letter chapters whenever they come out no matter what. Also, please shuichi do not cannibalize yourself. Please. Do not. That last paragraph in chapter 9 has e so worried.

Hi sorry! I would have answered this much sooner, but I got stuck in an Uno game that lasted for over an hour. BUT I'm finally free (⁠ﾉ⁠◕⁠ヮ⁠◕⁠)⁠ﾉ⁠*⁠.⁠✧

I'm expecting Love Letter to be at least 20 chapters or so. There will be two more nighttime segment chapters (Shuichi's pov), and the rest will be the daytime segments with Kokichi and Maki. We're nearing the end of this arc, and after that, the recovery will start. I won't give away too much, but we're drawing ever closer! ^_^ As for an estimate until the recovery chapters... I'd say at least 7 or 8...? Maybe?? I don't have the last few days planned out chapter-wise, so we'll have to see for that one ;o; it's at least over 5

If you can't stomach the gruesome bits, I really don't recommend reading the fic (⁠｡⁠ŏ⁠﹏⁠ŏ⁠) at least not the nighttime segments. Don't force yourself to read anything that makes you uncomfortable or ill!!

I can answer those three questions!

I have a lot of free time @_@ . Whenever I'm bored, I start writing. I have sooo many ideas and I love to share them! Everyone has been so supportive, and it's given me the confidence to post more and more of my stuff :) I write a lot and I write fast lol

Ever since I was little, I enjoyed the darker parts of fiction. I enjoy whump especially :p so I'm always thinking about different whump tropes and applying them to my favs. I also take a lot of inspiration from music and games-- M5DP was born between my replaying Your Turn To Die and an event that happened in a roleplay between me and my gf. The base idea for Fever Frost was born from the third Wings of Fire book, and reinforced with Kitchen Fork by Jack Conte. Impermanent Attachment happened because I found it funny to give Shuichi a gun, but also mostly because I had a Komahina timeloop fic I wanted to write for ao3 and just never got the confidence to at the time. (If anyone wants me to go more in depth with how I put these fics together, just ask. I have lots of notes o_O) I'm ALWAYS thinking and having ideas ^_^ trust me i would have way more fics up if i came to ao3 with the confidence to post my mer / vampire / dragons fics

? Honestly I'm not sure what this means, sorry QwQ I've been writing since my hands could touch a keyboard. I submitted a Pokémon fanfic for one of my 1st grade creative writing assignments. I take every story as seriously as the writer wants me to, and in the case of my own fics, there are some parts where the tone is serious and some parts where it's just like "wtf is going on". That "two late!" joke in Love Letter wasn't planned at ALL, it only happened because the idea made me giggle ;P

Anyhow, thank you!! Dread is a good emotion to have when it comes to Love Letter updates <3 /j I PROMISE the comfort will come. I cannot physically handle an unhappy ending,, or at the very least a hopeful one xD

As for Shuichi... well. I can't promise anything. O_o

[oswlld]

oswlld's monthly wrap up: may

note: i am trying something a bit different this year, so bear with me as i figure out how i want to format this. i wanted to spend more time sharing what i consume, beyond what i rb, and put my thoughts in one place. these posts are okay to rb

--

Arsenic and Adobo, Mia P. Manansala [started 05/18, finished 06/03] I didn’t dip my toes into the light murder mystery genre until now and to be honest, I’m not sure if it’s working for me. But I have seen recommendations floating around this series with filipino characters and wanted to check it out. The main character, Lila, is eerily specific to my personal experiences and upbringing, but the writing feels severely lacking because I’m actively looking for more character development and depth. My best friend clarified that this genre doesn’t really flesh out the characters in the way I want it to. In the end, it just fell flat for me. I gave it 3.5⭐️ on storygraph (which might be generous) — Crying in H-Mart, Michelle Zauner [started 05/09, finished 06/09] Have you even got a book that you know that you’ll love, so you just end up avoiding it at all costs? This is a memoir that I needed to read this slowly because it just felt incredibly special. And so painful. If you’re a first gen aapi with a difficult relationship with your mother, this is going to be a LOT for you. Sobbing, snotty, the whole works. Take long breaks in between reads if you need it. I luckily saved the heaviest part of the book for when I was taking an impromptu trip to the lake, surrounded by so much sun, mist, and life. The world was comforting me and wiping away my tears. 5.0⭐️ on storygraph!!

23.5 Degrees, GMMTV [started: 03/08, dnf] I only had time to catch episode 9 in May. I thought I would be able to complete the series this month, but alas it might be a DNF. Please tell me that the adorable teachers got together! — Doctor Who, Disney+ [started: 05/10, in prog] It shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone that DW is on here. I am a DW blog first, multifandom blog second. I’m loving the spin RTD is taking with the show for this run, having the genre touch on the supernatural/mythical/fantasy. It still has the same DNA but it’s so fresh. I only caught the first two eps on premiere week and haven’t had the time to keep up with the show weekly, but I am catching up soon. — Murderville, Netflix [started 02/10, finished: 05/23] I forgot to include this in my february wrap up, but I watched eps 1-4 back then and finally got around to seeing the last two eps this month. This show is such a delight! I love the unique twist on the concept of procedural improv, where the guest star actually have to solve the case at the end of the ep. They’re not there to just play off the other actors, they invite themselves to interact with the plot without taking it too seriously. If this sounds right up your alley to turn your brain down to like… 25%, please check this out. — Attack on Titan [started: 05/26, in prog] I have quite a journey ahead of me, but I’m happy to report that I LOVED the first ep. What a strong start to my anime era! This is gonna be my summer obsession, I can just feel it. By the time this posts, I will have seen eps two and maybe three(??). Gimme them right now, in an IV please. — Devil’s Plan, Netflix [started: 04/23, ALMOST complete] Bestie and I are OBSESSED with this competition series and we just learned there will be a s2, YAYY! This isn’t a show where you can turn your brain off. Now that I think about it, I don’t think there’s been a challenge I fully understood until ep 10, but man is it fun watching the contestants figure it out. They’re all SO intelligent and SOOO charming. And the games are so creative and elevated, it makes the stakes so charged! We are a few min into ep 11, out of 12, and we are planning to finish it this week. I don’t want this show to endddd!

Whew! I thought I didn’t watch much this month, but I covered a lot of ground on the TV front huh.

Pedro, Netflix [watched on 05/05] First off, you’ll be delighted to know that the artist and subject matter of the film, Pedro Friedeberg, has two cats named Wikipedia and Netflix. What I find so refreshing about this documentary in particular is Pedro, the unwilling participant during the process. The filmmaker, Liora Spilk Bialostozky, takes great care in sharing her insecurities about it. Liora is not shy about her adoration for her favorite artist and Pedro is very firm with his boundaries when pressed about his personal life. It makes for a very delightful, yet tense friendship between the two. — Polite Society [watched on 05/31] This is still fresh in my mind but what a spectacular film! LOVE how it puts the sister bond in the forefront of this classic action film, as well as all the female friendships. It makes the tonal shift flow seamlessly because the heart of the film beats strong. The best scene was the KHAN vs KHAN fight sequence, Ria vs Lena. The bashing, the biting, and the blood! The choice to make the final blow be self-inflicted, especially when it targets my personal experience, really took this film to new heights. I want to just ‘This movie has EVERYTHING’ meme the hell out of this. It has weird girls, judgmental aunties, college dropouts who have an estranged relationship with making art, torture scenes through the use of leg waxing, reproductive autonomy, FEMALE RAGE! It deserves to be up there when people think of 10 Things I Hate About You and Clueless.

GÉNESIS, Peso Pluma [first time listening] Before Coachella, I knew very little about Peso Pluma but his live performance really shot him to the top of my list of artists to catch up on. When I was little, my dad always had corrido playing in his car radio and to this day, he still occasionally plays it in the garage. What I really admire about GÉNESIS is the modern twists the artist takes in the production and writing, perfectly paying homage to the traditional without it sounding dated. I think it’s largely due to his vocals. He doesn’t shy away from perfecting at the cost of being authentic and it shines in songs such as Rubicon and 77. The latter half of the album really packs a punch, it’s so hard to pick a favorite. Everything from Lady Gaga to the end is just banger after banger after banger. Having this album play in my car… I really do take after my father. — LAS LETRAS YA NO IMPORTAN, Residente [first time listening] I first heard of Residente from the song Immigrants (We Get the Job Done) from the Hamilton Mixtape. Even then, I made a mental note to get back to him, but lost track of time until I started listening to Peso Pluma. This compilation consists of 23 songs and it’s such a sublime experience from beginning to end! It’s cinematic, it’s heavy, it’s a party, AND it’s skipless. He has a level of talent that has me raging!!! HE’S SO GOOOOOOD TF?!?!? The first time I heard 313, I wrote a note on my phone with “hhhhhhhh???!?!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!how dare he” and I stand by that statement. It’s almost six minutes long and not one second was wasted. Where Peso Pluma brings the traditional corrido to the present, Residente brings rap/hip-hop into the future. Whenever I get a chance to jump back into the album in the car, the songs I tend to gravitate towards are Artificial Inteligente, Cerebro, Yo No Sé Pero Sé, Que Fluya, and Las Letras Ya No Importan. This guy doesn’t miss, I hate him (affectionate). — Everything I Know About Love, Laufey [first time listening] This album is magnificent, I am UNWELL. The way I feel about this album is the same way I felt about Five Seconds Flat last summer: a feeling so bone deep, my soul begs for release. Bewitched was such a strong outing for me, so hearing little echos of it in the album before made the listen experience all the more enchanting. I’m so in love with this album. I’m actually convinced that Above the Chinese Restaurant is the most beautiful song I’ve ever heard. Ever. If I talk about this album more, it’s going to dig up so much of my deepest, darkest memories. I can’t… but also please talk to me about this album. — HIT ME HARD AND SOFT, Billie Eilish [first time listening] On gawd, what a stellar month for music, I can’t believe it! What a KNOCKOUT!! Billie and Finneas, I feel, have finally come home. They finally own their craft, refined it, and carved it into this marble masterpiece. Billie is more daring with her vocal range and exploring new avenues in her execution. The entirety of L’amour De Ma Vie was just me going “ARE YOU KIDDING ME????” 30 times over in the car. No but for real, is she joking? This is so ungodly, what am I supposed to do with myself?? HELP???? It’s a no-skip album, there is no top 5, no favorites list. It just is and it’s unbelievable that I can’t experience it for the first time all over again.

[tellthemeerkatsitsfine]

Sorry to give more attention to something that sucks, but I figure I'm not the only one who'd rather know than not know about a comedian I like in a case like this - remember last year, when Richard Ayoade gave that supportive quote on the cover of Graham Linehan's book? And it was disappointing, I figured that even if it's what I assume happens regularly with books like this, where they'll just get whatever famous friends they have to give some positive quote for the cover, even if those friends haven't read the book - even if it was that, that still sucks on Richard Ayoade's part, if he signed off on that for a book like this. But hey, maybe he just doesn't follow the news of which old colleagues of his have lost their minds on social media, maybe he didn't think that much about it, maybe he didn't even know what the book was about, maybe he didn't even write that quote himself. Still sucks, but doesn't necessarily mean all that much.

I fortunately wasn't a sufficiently invested fan of Richard Ayoade to be hugely upset about it. I mean, I wasn't happy. I find him very funny on panel shows and I think Garth Marenghi's Darkplace was a masterpiece. I am, however, sort of pleased that the fact that Richard Ayoade sucks now makes it more acceptable for me to say I've always found The IT Crowd overrated. Also, while he can be very very funny when he's good, his persona does get grating after a while (especially given that... look, if he's going to express support for a man who's so against people changing their outer markers to affect how they're perceived, it's worth noting that it's not his real voice). It annoys me that the running joke on Catsdown is how he's so good at it because he's such a nerd, and they keep doing that joke even though he does badly in all the games. He's not really that smart, he just puts on glasses and a nasal voice and identifies as a nerd. He often doesn't even seem like his heart is really in the persona, I think he just played one nerd in 2006 and then got typecast and stuck doing it forever. Garth Marenghi was still a masterpiece though.

Anyway, I've just been pointed to an episode of Gyles Brandreth's podcast from a few weeks ago, where Richard Ayoade featured as a guest and discussed Linehan. I listened to the relevant passage and can confirm that he did know what he was talking about when he gave that quote for the book, he talks about how Graham Linehan has been doing good work and treated unfairly, and has been accused of transphobia but really it's about women's rights. Thought I'd share that for the information of anyone who likes Richard Ayoade and, like me, would rather know that not know if a comedian we like is saying stuff like that. Sorry again for giving it more attention. I briefly considered posting the clip, but I don't think I need to spread the actual audio around - if you, like me, like to hear things from the actual source rather than relying on out-of-context secondhand accounts, you can hear it yourself on the Ayoade episode of the Rosebud podcast. But I don't really recommend doing that.

I'd love to say I'm not too upset by the Ayoade news because I don't do that kind of parasocial putting celebrities on pedestals, to the point where I'd be upset about them turning out to be bad. But that's not true, there are plenty of comedians to whom I have some scraps of faith in humanity tied, and those rare scraps would disappear if my favourite comedians came out in support of Graham Linehan. Richard Ayoade's just not one of them. It was Matthew Holness who made Garth Marenghi so great anyway. And he did a far better job in one scene than Richard Ayoade did in four seasons, of playing a nerd in an 00s sitcom that was created by a guy who's now an awful transphobe. Even in a niche as small as that, Richard Ayoade doesn't win.

In order to make this post not 100% about terrible people being terrible, I'm going to take this somewhat tenuous excuse to talk about Richard Ayoade's best friend from Cambridge, who is far better than Richard. A couple of years ago, I went to make one of my little Bugle compilations, it got out of hand as I kept adding stuff to it, and I accidentally made a feature film. I entitled it A Groundhog Day of Hatred, as it chronicled the saga of John Oliver vs. Sarah Palin, every time their careers regrettably crossed paths. In September 2023, I updated that film with a few further bits, and released a second edition, which runs at 78 minutes. It's too many minutes.

To accompany the second edition, I thought it would be funny to create a movie poster. I got one quote from the excellent @lastweeksshirttonight, but thought it needed another quote, as all good promotional images are accompanied by quotes of famous people talking up the work. I realized that actually, John Oliver's old friend/Footlights teammate had recently given one of those promotional quotes that, by coincidence, would work just as well to describe my movie as it did to describe the work that that quote was originally used to promote. In fact, it would work even better. Because the story of John Oliver trying to cover Sarah Palin's political career really is the tale of a hero's harrowing journey, unlike Linehan's shit book.

So basically, if you find Richard Ayoade's political views disappointing, you can just look at that quote he gave Graham Linehan's book, and imagine he was instead describing this:

[novelmonger]

1-4 & 10-12 for The Unlikely Escape of Uriah Heep, 9-15 for FMA, 1 & 16-18 for Anne of Green Gables, 8-12 for Half-Magic, and 1, 3, 19, and 20 for The Little Riders, please?

The Unlikely Escape of Uriah Heep by H.G. Parry

what got you into this story?

My dear friend @rainintheevening recommended it to me, and I'm so glad she did! I wasn't even 20 pages in before I looked up from the page and went, "Ohoho, this book was definitely written for me!"

2. describe it in one or two sentences.

Charley Sutherland has always had the ability to read characters out of books and into real life. But when Uriah Heep, the villain from David Copperfield, begins to cause trouble, his older brother (who is perfectly ordinary in every way) will have to go to great lengths to help him out of his predicament.

3. quickly list 3 things you like about the story!

IT'S ABOUT BROTHERS

IT'S A BOOK ABOUT BOOKS

It started to look like the ending was going to be tragic, BUT IT WASN'T I CRYYYYYYYYYY T^T

4. assign this story a hyper-specific genre name, e.g. "inspirational religious semi-horror sci-fi western" (yes, that's Trigun)

Speculative literary brother fiction crossover thriller

10. if you made an amv about this, what song would you set it to?

"Brother" by Kodaline

I mean, would you look at these lyrics?

Oh brother, we'll go deeper than the ink Beneath the skin of our tattoos Though we don't share the same blood You're my brother and I love you that's the truth

;aldksj;sdkfl;sdkfldslkfj TT___TT

11. if you were put in the main character's position, how well would that go for you on a scale of 1-5?

Umm...maybe like a 4? Rob is a very normal kind of guy, and while I'm not a lawyer like him, most of the things he does are fairly ordinary, all things considered. (Well, it's not an ordinary situation at all, but I mean he doesn't have hidden magic or anything.) There's nothing particularly special about him except the lengths he's willing to go to for his brother. And I'd like to think I would do the same for my siblings if need be.

12. assuming your loved ones would be there, would you want to live in the world of the story?

YES. A world where I could potentially meet my favorite characters from beloved stories? Yeah, okay, some of the more unsavory characters show up too, but...like...I could have tea with Dumbledore. I could share crunchings and munchings with Gurgi. I could hang out with Pippi Longstocking! Maybe I could even give Kaladin Stormblessed a hug :')

Full Metal Alchemist by Hiromu Arakawa

9. give the most UNHELPFUL and/or SILLY summary possible.

A fake human uses a double amputee, a tin can, a war criminal, a butcher, and some old guy to try to become God. He fails because he didn't brush up on meteorology enough.

10. if you made an amv about this, what song would you set it to?

Funny you should ask, because I've got several ideas floating around in my head that I could actually make a reality if I just sat down and took the time! The first AMV idea I ever got, years and years ago, was one set to "Memories" by Within Temptation.

11. if you were put in the main character's position, how well would that go for you on a scale of 1-5?

Lol. 1. I would die immediately. I don't have a head for numbers or science, so I would probably be horrible at alchemy. Even if I somehow got clap-alchemy from the Truth (though how I'd be able to manage human transmutation to get that far is anyone's guess), I would fail miserably to do the things Ed does, because I am very flabby and weak and cowardly. Also I don't think I would have the gumption to do half the things he does, like pushing through the pain of automail surgery. Yeah, sorry, the world is doomed if I'm put in Ed's place.

12. assuming your loved ones would be there, would you want to live in the world of the story?

As much as I adore this story, I think I'd actually say no. There's so much danger and war on every side, and I don't much fancy the thought of losing my soul to a whirling vortex (even if my soul does get put back!). I've already laid out how I wouldn't be an alchemist, so there wouldn't even be that to compensate. Maybe I'd visit after it's no longer a fascist military state, though.

13. tell me an out-of-context piece of worldbuilding or lore!

Did you know that Amestris was the wife of Artaxerxes, king of Persia?

14. how likely do you think this story is to break a reader's heart? If you're not done with the story, just guess.

I'm biased, but I think it's pretty much guaranteed. If your heart doesn't break at least a little bit at a certain little girl and her dog, I'm not sure you have one. And there are so many other parts where I cried really hard, not least at the ending of the first anime. All I wanted to do after I finished it the first time was lie in my bed, staring at the ceiling and trying to figure out how to carry on with my life ^^'

15. what time are you most likely to be found reading/watching this story? (time of year, time of day, season of life, whatever makes sense to you)

ALL DAY ALL THE TIME.

Lol, that would have been my answer in my teenage years, but admittedly my attention has strayed to other fandoms more recently. I'm still down to read/watch FMA anytime at the drop of a hat, but these days I'm most likely to dip back into it this time of year, because I always try to have something to post for FMA Day on October 3rd. (Which reminds me, I need to get cracking on that D:)

Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery

what got you into this story?

I guess you could call it peer pressure, kinda? I just kept hearing people praising it over the years, until finally I decided I should probably see what all the fuss was about, rather than just writing it off as Not For Me because I decided that back when I was eight or something. And once I did start reading, it didn't take long for Anne to win me over ^_^

16. do you think this story has broad appeal, or is it meant for a very specific audience? if it's more "niche", what kind of person would most enjoy this story?

I do think it has broad appeal, though I'd still say it's not for everybody. Clearly, Baby Novie decided it wasn't for her because there wasn't enough high adventure in it. I think most people would be able to find something relatable or at least enjoyable about it, but some people might need to wait until they're mature enough to appreciate its merits ;)

17. compare this story to your usual tastes. how does it differ from what you've already enjoyed?

I usually prefer books with more fantastical elements in them, or at least adventuring, and that was especially true when I tried to read this book as a kid. I will certainly read the occasional historical fiction about ordinary, everyday ups and downs, but even so, I'm usually more inclined to reach for something like Austen or Dickens that has a more complicated, twisty-turny plot.

18. compare this story to your usual tastes. what parts of it are exactly the kind of thing you've always loved?

I'm actually kind of surprised this was never assigned for school, because it feels a lot like the kind of book I read a lot, and probably one I would have enjoyed more than some of the other stuff we had to read. If I'd only made the connection that it takes place around the same time as the Mandie books, I probably would have really latched onto it (even though Anne isn't about mysteries), because that was my bread and butter for several years as a kid. And Anne of Green Gables would have been much less embarrassing to return to as an adult ^^' Another element that is common to many stories I love is how friendship is treasured so highly.

Half Magic by Edward Eager

8. what questions are or were you most excited to learn the answers to while experiencing the story for the first time?

Oh man, it's been so long since the first time I read this book, I can't really remember. Especially because I was never really an "active reader" as a kid. I never stopped to ask questions, I just inhaled stories, and whatever happened in it, that was how it obviously had to be ^^' And by now, I've read the book so many times I know it back to front, and there aren't really any more questions that I care about.

At a guess, though, I might have wondered where the talisman came from and where I could get one :P

9. give the most UNHELPFUL and/or SILLY summary possible.

This book teaches you about fractions :)

10. if you made an amv about this, what song would you set it to?

Uhhhh...I really don't know. Probably some kind of instrumental track, maybe piano? And it would just be a montage of the whole story, I think.

11. if you were put in the main character's position, how well would that go for you on a scale of 1-5?

I'd say a 4 or a 5. I'd like to think I'd do pretty well at remembering not to say "I wish" out loud as much as they do, but that's never how these things go. But most of the times I say that, it's usually just things like "I wish I could remember..." or "I wish I knew why..." And I don't see how the consequences of that kind of accidental wish could be too dire XD

12. assuming your loved ones would be there, would you want to live in the world of the story?

A THOUSAND TIMES YES. How many times did I daydream about what my siblings and I would do if we got a wish-granting adventure like in the books? It might be a little annoying to have to put up with 1920s America or whenever it's supposed to be, but...wish-granting talisman. Come on.

The Little Riders by Margaretha Shemin

what got you into this story?

This was assigned for school. I don't remember when exactly that was, but I think it was a read-aloud rather than one I read to myself, so maybe first or second grade? And I just remember it being one of the books that stood out to me amongst all the others.

3. quickly list 3 things you like about the story!

It offers a unique perspective on WWII, humanizing the Nazi soldiers when most of the time, we're all content to just think of them as nothing but monsters.

It's tense and exciting - will the soldier find the little riders?!

Illustrated by Peter Spier, a staple of my childhood picture books!

19. pitch an idea for a sequel or spinoff novel for this story!

What about a parallel story about the soldier's family? What was their experience like during the war?

20. what's the WORST thing about this story, in your opinion? (feel free to be positive, e.g. "it's not longer", if you want!)

Okay, yes, I could definitely do with a longer version of this book. I would have liked more exploration of Johanna's experience of being an American girl growing up in Holland with her grandparents. Did she have culture shock at first? Does she feel more at home in Holland now? For the lack of exploration they do into her unique situation, I almost think it would have been better to just have her be a Dutch girl who's lived in Holland all her life. The extra details of her father being in the U.S. Navy kind of feels superfluous.

Story Ask Game